Misbehavior Number 101
by keeptheotherone
Summary: When James's misbehavior continues despite detentions, losing house points, and even a Howler from home, a desperate Ginny decides the only thing left is to join him at Hogwarts. The conflict between mother and son creates a comedy of errors as James learns to handle fame by default and Ginny discovers Hogwarts isn't any easier the second time around.
1. Chapter 1

A/N: I know parents would not be allowed to follow their children around at a British boarding school, but it presents so many opportunities for drama and humor that I couldn't resist :) I decided to keep Minerva McGonagall as Headmistress even though JKR said McGonagall was not Headmistress when the Next-Gen went to Hogwarts. The reason she gave was McGonagall's age, and that just doesn't make sense to me, not with the information we have about Dumbledore. Just for fun, this chapter has a reference to the movie _A Christmas Story. _Oh, and I will update every Wednesday. And no fanfic is complete without...

Disclaimer: Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry and the characters from _Harry Potter_ belong to their author, J. K. Rowling, and are not being used for profit. The plot and original characters are, well, original with me. The cover image is concept art from the _Harry Potter_ movies.

* * *

_Tuesday morning, October 5, 2021_

_the Potter residence_

Ginny Potter recognized the heavy yellow parchment of the envelope in the owl's beak and groaned.

"Not again." She set down her teacup and took the letter from the owl, feeding her a bit of sausage before she flew off. "This is the third time this year!"

"Maybe it's not about James," Harry said. "We do have two other children at Hogwarts."

"It's James," Ginny said. "And he's—"

"What's he done this time?" Harry folded down one corner of the_ Daily Prophet_ to look at her.

"He's—he's—he's made himself hippogriff feed, that's what he's done!" Ginny shouted. "Fireworks! Potions! _Hospital wing_—I'll show him the hospital wing!"

"Ginny, what—" Truly alarmed now, Harry put down the newspaper and followed his wife upstairs to her office.

"Sixth year! Prefect! Quidditch Captain! We'll see about that!"

"Is James hurt? Is he in the hospital wing? What happened?"

Ginny threw open her roll top desk so forcefully that the tambour bounced halfway closed. She shoved it open again, holding her hand at the edge to keep it in place, then began opening the drawers concealed behind it.

"Where is the Howler paper?"

"Ginny! Is James all right?"

"No. No, he's not, not once I finish with him—aha!" She held up a fistful of red parchment in triumph, then grabbed a quill.

Finally deciding that a Howler would not be the primary thing on Ginny's mind if James were injured, Harry went downstairs to read the letter written on official Hogwarts stationery as Ginny began dictating the Howler.

_Dear Harry and Ginny,_

_I've been cutting James as much slack as I reasonably can, but as two pupils remain in the hospital wing as I write this, I feel I have no choice but to notify you of what happened in Potions today. Professor Fawley's lesson was interrupted when James threw a Weasleys' Wild-Fire Whiz-Bang into one of the cauldrons of Mandrake Draught. Six pupils were injured, but as I mentioned, two were burned badly enough that Madame Branstone wanted to keep them overnight. As far as I have been able to determine, there was absolutely no provocation for this incident; James's only defense was that he was bored. _

_He most certainly should not be bored: he has six N.E.W.T.-level classes, prefect duties, and Quidditch practice started last week. He is also still in detention with Padma for the boggart incident (it goes without saying that Professor Fawley has put James in weekly detention for the foreseeable future), and his last essay for me was eight inches short of the required twenty-four. I am not sure if he is showing off for Holly Jordan or if he actually wants me to remove him as prefect. I would have done it already if I thought it would have any effect at all. If his behavior doesn't markedly improve and soon, I'm afraid I will be forced to remove him from the Quidditch team, and we all know I don't want to do that._

_If you two have any ideas for how to handle James, I'm open to suggestions. He didn't say a word when I kept him after class to discuss his essay, he's avoiding Louis's attempts to counsel him on proper prefect conduct, and he was so sharp with Rose yesterday at dinner that she was nearly in tears. Something is obviously bothering him, but if anyone in the family knows what it is, they're not saying. _

_And Ginny, would you speak to George about decreasing the family discount? The number of Wheezes floating around here is getting out of hand._

_Sincerely yours,_

_Neville_

_Professor Neville Longbottom_

_Head of Gryffindor House_

_Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry_

"Six pupils, Harry!" Ginny said, furiously scribbling James's name on the envelope. "Two of them kept overnight! I have _never_ tolerated pranks or horseplay that resulted in someone getting hurt."

"I know," Harry said. "What do you think is bothering him?"

"I don't know and I don't care." She dotted an"i" with a vicious stab. "He thinks because he's hundreds of miles away in another country that he can do whatever he pleases, that he doesn't have to deal with his mother. Well, we'll see about that!"

()()()()

_Tuesday morning, October 5_

_Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry_

James Potter and Cameron Davies stood outside the Transfiguration classroom under James's Invisibility Cloak. The third-years were studying Animagi and according to James's cousin Hugo, Professor Burke had invited the Headmistress, an Animagus herself, to guest lecture today. James and Cameron heard the tapping of her cane on the stone floor and watched as she appeared from around a corner and entered the classroom. Once the door had closed, James pulled out an Extrasensory Extension, fed the small end under the door, and positioned the screen so he and Cameron could both see it.

"Out of all the awesome stuff in your uncle's shop, this is my favorite," Cameron whispered as the classroom came into view.

Headmistress McGonagall stood beside the teacher's desk, then in the blink of an eye, transformed into a tabby cat, leapt on top of it, and surveyed the classroom with the same beady-eyed stare she possessed in her human form. The third years, including Hugo and James's sister Lily, gasped and applauded.

"Any minute now…." James held his breath.

Kitty McGonagall sniffed. She turned her head. She sniffed again. Her whiskers twitched, and … she leapt over Professor Burke's shoulder, trotted along the ledge of the blackboard, and jumped onto the windowsill. She knocked over Professor Burke's display of carriage clocks (which just last week had been wristwatches) with a series of crashes that sent the nearest row of pupils scrambling out of their seats, nudged aside the curtain, and pounced on the catnip placed there late last night by James. Lily grabbed the pot and held it over her head, but the cat meowed in protest and sprang onto Lily's shoulder, balancing with one front paw on the girl's head and swatting at the plant with the other.

Lily ducked and cringed. "Ow! Professor! Ow, your claws are digging into my shoulder—Professor!"

James and Cameron roared with laughter, shaking so hard it was difficult to keep the screen of the Extrasensory Extension in view. Professor Burke rushed to Lily's aid and pried the tabby away from her as the cat yowled and struggled to reach the treat. Ginger hair dangling from her plait, Lily opened the storage cupboard, set the catnip inside, and slammed the door shut. Professor Burke carried the hissing Headmistress to the front of the room, set her on the floor, pointed her wand, and Professor McGonagall was herself again.

The classroom door banged open, and James felt himself frozen in place. He listed against Cameron, balanced for the briefest moment, then both boys fell into an undignified heap. Cameron's elbow was digging into James's ribs, and his neck was bent uncomfortably against the cold stone floor. James heard Professor Burke apologizing profusely to the Headmistress and her crisp voice issuing an apology in return. There was the clamor and chimes of the repairing clocks and an apology to his sister accompanied by a healing charm. He heard the _tap, tap, tap_ of Professor McGonagall's cane but was unable to cringe in horror; Professor Burke had cast a Full Body-Bind. He felt a touch on his ankle and then a draft of air as the Invisibility Cloak was pulled away. Professor McGonagall moved into his line of vision. Her robes were rumpled, and her mouth was very, very thin.

"Professor Burke, perhaps you would be so kind as to release them? I hardly trust myself to point a wand in their direction."

James and Cameron followed McGonagall through the halls and up the stairs to her office on the seventh floor. She moved the gargoyle aside with a wave of her wand, and they rode up the spiral staircase in silence.

"Mr. Potter, wait here. Mr. Davies." She opened the door and followed Cameron into her office.

James leaned against the wall and tried not to think about how his parents would react to this latest indiscretion. He and Cameron weren't supposed to get caught; that's what the Cloak was for. Ginny had sent a rather stern letter a fortnight ago, after James stashed a boggart in the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom and terrified a group of second years, including his cousin Roxie. Uncle George had threatened to eliminate his family discount at the shop. Even Harry had signed that letter, saying he expected more mature behavior from his oldest son. James snorted. That was the problem, wasn't it? Everyone had expectations of Harry and Ginny Potter's oldest son.

Cameron came out in a surprisingly short time.

"What did she say?"

"Detention with—"

"Mr. Potter," McGonagall called.

Cameron grimaced his sympathy, and James entered the Headmistress's office. The usual chairs in front of her desk were absent. She was fingering the Invisibility Cloak.

"The last time I saw this was the night of the Final Battle. Your father and Luna Lovegood appeared from underneath it in Ravenclaw Tower."

James stared straight over the Headmistress's head and suppressed his curiosity. His dad had been a Gryffindor like he was.

"I am keeping it. I will discuss with your parents when, and if, you may have it back."

He clenched his jaw but made no protest.

"Turn out your pockets."

James handed over his wand, the Extrasensory Extension, two Chocolate Frogs, a broken quill, and—his heart stopped. The Marauder's Map was still in his pocket!

"Both pockets, Mr. Potter."

James slapped the blank parchment onto her desk. McGonagall didn't flinch. She tossed the quill in the bin, stacked the map and the Extrasensory Extension on top of the folded Invisibility Cloak, and returned his wand and the Chocolate Frogs.

"I would like to know," she said evenly, "what it is I have done to anger you such that you would humiliate me in that way."

James looked at her for the first time. "I—there isn't—"

She met his gaze without blinking, and he felt the first touch of shame.

"It wasn't anything personal, Professor," he said, staring at the stack of magical items on her desk. "We just thought it would be funny."

"I see. When did you place the catnip in the window?"

"Last night," he muttered.

"You were out after curfew?"

"No, ma'am. Well, yes, but—I did it during prefect rounds. I said I needed to go to the bathroom and went by the Transfiguration classroom instead."

"Am I correct in assuming this prank was your idea and Mr. Davies was merely your accomplice?"

He nodded.

"What about Mr. Weasley or Miss Potter?"

"Hugo and Lily didn't know anything about it." Which was true. James had simply asked Hugo to tell him when McGonagall was scheduled to speak to the class; James hadn't said anything about what he was planning.

"Mr. Potter, you are temporarily relieved of prefect duties and are confined to the Gryffindor Common Room except for lessons and meals. You will notify your team that all Quidditch practices are cancelled."

"But, Professor—"

"When is the next prefects' meeting?"

"Not until Sunday."

"Very well, I will speak to the Head Boy and Girl and have them call a meeting this evening. You will inform the other prefects they will have to shoulder your duties until further notice."

James's heart sank. That would not go over well. Everyone was busy with lessons and activities of their own, and his cousin Louis, the Head Boy, would be especially upset.

"But, Professor—Quidditch. It's not fair to penalize the other players."

"No, it isn't, Mr. Potter, and if you were not Captain, I would not do so. But as Captain, your actions affect the entire team. Perhaps you will consider that in the future."

"Yes, Professor."

"I will be writing to your parents as well. As I said, I will leave it up to them what to do with the items I have confiscated."

At the mention of his parents, James returned to staring stonily outside the window.

"You may go."

()()()()

_Wednesday morning_

_the Great Hall_

James scanned the Slytherin table as he entered the Great Hall, looking for the distinctive ginger hair of his little sister. She was sitting with a group of girls halfway down the table, all of whom smiled brightly at his arrival.

"Lily, can I talk to you for a minute?"

She shrugged.

"How's your shoulder?"

"Fine."

"Look, I just need a minute."

She set down her toast with a scowl and followed him to the back of the hall. James pulled her out of the path of traffic.

"Please don't say anything to Mum and Dad about getting scratched up in Transfiguration yesterday."

"That was really mean, baiting Professor McGonagall like that. Dad's going to go mental when he finds out. You know how much he likes her."

"I wasn't trying to be mean. I just thought it would be funny."

"Fifty years ago, maybe," Lily retorted. "You didn't see her when she transfigured back to a human, all crumpled on the floor. She needed help just to stand up. She's an old woman, James!"

He shifted his weight. "I know, I'm sorry, just—don't tell Mum and Dad you got hurt. They're going to be mad enough as it is. Okay?"

"I won't lie, but I won't volunteer anything, either."

James sighed. "Thanks, Lils. I owe you."

"Just stay away from me. You're on everyone's bad side right now."

James found Cameron and sat down just as the owls flew in with the morning post. Galahad, his parents' owl, soared over the table and dropped a red envelope on his empty plate. Pupils on both sides of the table started backing away, but Cameron stayed by his side.

"It's already smoking, James, I don't think—"

_BANG!_

"James. Sirius. Potter." His mother's voice, magically magnified yet strangely quiet, filled the Great Hall. "There are many things I have allowed you to get away with, but one thing I have never tolerated—never!—"

Ginny's voice was increasing in volume.

"Is hurting someone else. _Six pupils_, James! Six! Two of whom may still be in the hospital wing at this very moment, and for what?"

James slouched on the bench and hid behind one hand. She was just getting started.

"I don't know what you were thinking—wait, yes I do! YOU WEREN'T THINKING! SIXTEEN YEARS OLD, AND THAT IS ONE OF THE STUPIDEST, MOST DANGEROUS, MOST POINTLESS PRANKS I HAVE EVER HEARD OF, AND _I GREW UP WITH FRED AND GEORGE_! YOUR UNCLE DID NOT SELL YOU THOSE FIREWORKS SO YOU COULD BURN SOMEONE'S EYES OUT, AND YOUR FATHER AND I ARE NOT SENDING YOU TO SCHOOL TO BECOME A CRIMINAL! THIS IS THE THIRD LETTER WE'VE RECEIVED THIS YEAR AND IT'S BARELY _OCTOBER_! IF YOU KEEP THIS UP, IT'S NOT GOING TO BE YOUR PREFECT BADGE THAT'S REVOKED, IT'S GOING TO BE THAT CAPTAIN'S BADGE, AND I'LL BE THE ONE TO TAKE IT! _AND_ YOUR BROOMSTICK! ONE MORE LETTER FROM NEVILLE OR MCGONAGALL, AND I _WILL_ COME UP THERE, AND YOU _WILL NOT_ LIKE IT!

"Love, Mum."

The letter ignited. A hush had settled over the Great Hall as everyone stared at him. James shoved the plateful of ash away and ran out of the hall.


	2. Chapter 2

A/N: Professor Goldstein is Padma Patil Goldstein. I thought you might wonder why I referred to her as a "she" ;)

* * *

_Wednesday morning_

_the Hogwarts grounds_

James plunged down the stone steps onto the grounds. Why did she have to send a Howler? Why had she shortened the charm so that it opened before he had a chance to get off by himself? Everyone already knew who he was; he didn't need his mother yelling at him in front of the whole school like he was a child. He was sixteen years old, for Merlin's sake. Almost a grown man! He hadn't meant for anyone to get hurt like that. It had scared him, seeing Millie and Caitlin crying with their hands over their faces, but had his mum thought of that? No! It was always what he did wrong, how he messed up, and it was never private, never! James swiped an arm across his face when he saw Cameron approaching.

"Hey." Cameron tossed James's schoolbag on the ground beside him and sat down. "You're not supposed to be out here. Potions starts in ten minutes."

"Screw Potions, and screw McGonagall."

"Fawley will still be mad about the fireworks. You don't want to be late."

"Screw him too."

"Are you trying to get kicked off the team, James?"

James stared out over the lake. He didn't even know why he'd come here; it was his dad's tree. His dad and Uncle Ron and Aunt Hermione's, the beech tree they had sat and revised under, had planned to leave school under. Maybe that was why. He'd like nothing better than to leave school right now, except that it meant he'd have to go home.

He didn't think he would be particularly welcome.

"I'm sorry about the Howler. Mums can be a real pain."

"You have no idea."

"She doesn't know about yesterday, does she?"

James finally turned to look at his friend. "What?"

"Yesterday. She doesn't know. Everything in her letter was about Potions on Monday. She must not have got McGonagall's letter about the catnip before she sent the Howler."

James stared, feeling the resentment stretch into horror. "Shit! She talked about taking my broomstick. She said—she said one more letter, and she'd come up here!"

"Surely she didn't mean it," Cameron said quickly. "Parents aren't allowed at Hogwarts, right? Not unless their kid's really sick or something."

James gave a bitter laugh. "Yeah, but my mum's Ginny Weasley Potter. She can do whatever the hell she likes."

"Well, your mum can't take you off the team. McGonagall or Longbottom would have to do that."

"But she could take my broomstick, and you know what the school brooms are like. We'll never win the Cup if I have to ride one of those artifacts!"

"Then we'd better get to class, mate. Don't want to give your mum anything else to yell about."

"Shit," James said again, and the two boys sprinted for the castle.

()()()()

_Friday morning_

_Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry_

Ginny strode up the drive, her eyes fixed straight ahead on the double doors to Hogwarts Castle. She didn't want to see the spot where….

The Entrance Hall was eerily quiet and empty; first period had already started. As she climbed the marble staircase, she automatically glanced at the hourglasses. Ravenclaw was in the lead. She was recognized by the portraits as she walked down corridors and climbed staircases to the Headmistress's office. She heard their muttering and watched them dash from frame to frame to spread the news of her arrival.

It felt strange to be back; she hadn't been to Hogwarts since she left … Merlin, twenty-two years ago. It felt even stranger that everything looked so familiar; perhaps a few new portraits here and there, and the Quidditch stands had been painted, and the Whomping Willow was considerably larger, but the front gates with their winged boar statues, the Entrance Hall, the marble staircase, the glass hourglasses that tracked the house points, were all just as they had always been. Her feet were carrying her to the Head's office without any special effort at all.

Ginny eyed the stone gargoyle guarding the entrance. She had no idea of the password, and she hadn't notified McGonagall she was coming; Ginny was afraid her idea would have been vetoed immediately. She knew the Minister of Magic and various other outsiders had visited the castle when she was at school, and surely they wouldn't have known the password either. Although they were probably expected and had an appointment, she thought. No matter; the magic in the castle was incredibly intuitive, and at least one of the portraits would have traveled to the Headmistress's office to announce Ginny's presence.

"Ginny Potter for Headmistress McGonagall," she told the gargoyle.

It did not move aside or answer her. She tipped her head, considering. She could probably find Neville in the greenhouses, but she would wait a few minutes first. It was a long walk back downstairs, and she had forgotten how far it was from the gates to the castle until she'd had to walk it in the chilly morning mist.

Ginny jumped as the gargoyle moved aside and the stone wall behind it split vertically, revealing a moving staircase. She stepped onto it, rapped the brass griffin door knocker at the top of the staircase three times, and entered when bade.

Minerva McGonagall sat behind her desk with a scroll of parchment draped over the edge. She finished her sentence, returned her quill to its ink pot, and fixed Ginny with her trademark beady stare.

"So, Mrs. Potter, to what do I owe this unexpected pleasure?"

"It's about James. Nothing seems to be getting through to him, so I have decided a visit from his mother is in order."

"A visit," McGonagall repeated.

"Yes."

"Of what duration?"

"As long as it takes," Ginny said.

McGonagall's brows arched. "And the nature of this visit?"

"I'm going to shadow him. Attend his lessons, sit with him at meals, follow him around in his free time. The idea is to make his life miserable enough that following the rules starts to look like a pretty good alternative."

"Parents are not allowed at Hogwarts except in cases of extreme illness or injury. This is neither."

"I know that," Ginny said shortly. "But I'm his mother, and he's ultimately my responsibility, not yours. It's my decision what's best for him, and honestly, I don't know what else to do. We cannot allow him to continue on like this. Not when people are getting hurt."

McGonagall's expression lost some of its severity, and she fetched a teapot and two cups from the credenza behind her. A tap of her wand filled the kettle with water, and a second tap heated it instantly. She began to pour.

"Sometimes, you remind me very much of your mother."

Ginny sat back in surprise. "Thank you?"

"Yes, it's a compliment. She never lost sight of her job as mother, even when you all were out of her sight."

"It's much more difficult than I ever imagined," Ginny admitted, accepting a cup from her former teacher. "I thought as long as we didn't have a whole houseful, it would be okay, but…."

"What does Harry have to say about this?"

Ginny grimaced. "Harry is livid. I practically had to sit on him to keep him from storming up here when we got your owl, and I gave all my Howler parchment to Hermione. I reckoned one per week was enough. I haven't been able to hide anything from Harry since Auror training."

"I understand your concern, but I'm not sure this is the right way to go about influencing James's behavior. You are famous and popular, Ginny. One has to question how much of a punishment this will be. Your presence will cause a considerable disturbance and only increase the attention James already receives."

"I'm not here as a former Quidditch player or a DA member or even Harry's wife. I'm just James's mum. His ticked off, fed up, at-her-wit's-end mum."

"Nevertheless, you are all of those things. I'm afraid 'James's mum' is rather low on the list."

"Not for me, it's not," Ginny retorted. "I'll do my best not to make things more difficult for you, Professor, but I am going to do this for James. Harry and I don't know what's wrong, but James needs his mother, even if he doesn't realize it."

"What about Albus and Lily, and your nieces and nephews?"

"This is James's punishment, not theirs. I'll keep my distance."

"And if I say no?"

Ginny had anticipated this question. She looked the Headmistress full in the face. "Then Harry and I will appeal to the Board of Governors. I'm sorry, Professor. You know I respect your leadership, but something _must_ be done about James. He's been unmanageable all summer, and we've tried everything else. If we take Quidditch away from him, he'll sulk and act out even worse, and I think Neville's right—James actually wants him to take his prefect badge away, and I'm not going to play into that. He needs to learn to shoulder the responsibility."

"Very well. But when this goes bad, do not expect me to clean up your mess."

"Of course not, Professor."

"Have you made arrangements for lodging?"

"Actually, I was hoping I could stay here."

"I'll tell Mr. Ward to give you a key to one of the guest suites. Do you know where they are?"

Ginny shook her head.

"Perhaps this will be of assistance." McGonagall opened her desk drawer and pulled out a familiar piece of old, blank parchment.

"The—"

"The Marauder's Map, I believe it is called," McGonagall said. "Remus told me, although admittedly not until after Harry did not return for his seventh year. James had it in his pocket. I also confiscated the Invisibility Cloak and some item that looks as if it came from Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes." She stood and crossed to a cabinet, pulling out the named items. "I told James I would leave it up to you and Harry to decide when to return them to him."

Ginny ran her hand over the Cloak, feeling its fine texture. "Until this week, I think Harry was more upset that James was getting caught than he was about the pranks themselves."

"I would not be surprised," McGonagall said dryly. She remained standing.

Ginny stood as well. "Thank you, Professor."

"I hope this works, Ginny."

()()()()

_Friday morning_

_Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom_

James concentrated on the tip of his wand, trying to form a nonverbal Shield Charm. He needed to get the hang of nonverbal spells; they were a requirement for the Auror Academy. Professor Goldstein walked around the room, correcting grips, demonstrating wand movements, and generally providing assistance. He had to hand it to her; despite the detentions, she was not holding his prank with the boggart against him. She had just finished with him and Cameron, having had James cast a verbal Shield Charm while focusing on the feel of magic extending from his hand out through his wand. He was trying to duplicate the sensation without saying the incantation aloud and was sort of succeeding; the shield was strongest directly in front of him, but the jinxes Cameron aimed from the side were sliding through. They continued practicing, casting and reversing spells, until the bell rang for morning break.

James threw his bag over his shoulder and joined the queue to leave the classroom. Everyone was whispering and staring as they entered the hallway, and the queue moved much more slowly than usual. As soon as he reached the doorway, James saw why: his mother stood against the opposite wall.

"Hi, Mrs. Potter," Cameron said, peering around James's shoulder.

"Mum? What are you doing here?"

"Hello, Cameron, how are you?"

"Fine, thanks. I'll, uh, I'll see you later, James." Cameron backed down the hallway, gesturing wildly behind Ginny's back.

"Mum, what are you doing here?" James hissed. The crowd in the corridor was worse than usual as everyone inched by, trying to overhear their conversation.

"Is there an empty classroom nearby?"

James led the way down the hall and around the corner, where the crowd thinned as most of the pupils continued towards the marble staircase.

"Why are you here?" he asked as soon as she closed the door behind them.

"I told you if we received one more letter, I was coming up."

"You can't count what happened with McGonagall—I didn't get that Howler until after I'd already put the catnip in Professor Burke's classroom!"

His mother was more than half a foot shorter than he was, but her flashing eyes and tense posture were still intimidating. James took a step back.

"You couldn't even stay out of trouble for twenty-four hours. One day, son! The owls must have passed each other in flight!"

"But I haven't done anything since! Not a thing since you said you'd come up here and take my broomstick."

Ginny raised one eyebrow. "And how much of that has to do with the fact you no longer have the map or the Cloak? Although neither one seems to have been particularly helpful in avoiding detection."

"Yes, they have," James shot back, then winced as her other eyebrow raised. He'd just admitted to breaking more rules than she already knew about. He dropped his rucksack and sat down on a desk. "Are you here to take my broomstick?"

"Not yet. I'm here for a visit."

James eyed her suspiciously. "What does that mean?"

"It means I'm your new shadow," she said, smiling what his uncle George referred to as the Evil Expression. "You've been acting like a child, so I'm going to treat you like one. I'll be attending lessons and meals and hanging out with you every day, just like I did when you were little."

He gaped at her. "But—but—"

"I told you you wouldn't like it if I had to come up here."

"Mum, I'm really sorry. I didn't mean for the firework to land in Millie's cauldron. It was supposed to explode Holly's bag. I never wanted anyone to get hurt, and that prank with McGonagall was just—just stupid. I'm really sorry, and I _swear_ I won't get in trouble again, not the whole term. I promise."

"Well, I'm very glad to hear it," she said. "Even if I don't believe it."

James dropped the act and scowled at her. "For how long?"

"As long as it takes for you to convince me that you've had a sincere change of heart and your dad and I can rely on you to uphold your responsibilities as a sixth-year prefect and Quidditch captain. At least a couple of weeks, I reckon."

He jumped up. "_Weeks_!"

"You ought to be thanking me. You very nearly had a visit from your father when he saw the letter from Professor McGonagall. I haven't seen him that angry since the press coverage of Lily's Sorting."

James winced. Harry had still been furious when they went home that Christmas.

"You're really staying."

"I really am. McGonagall is arranging for me to have one of the guest suites."

"What about your job? Quidditch season is just starting."

"I can write from anywhere."

"So, you'll still be going to the practices?" James said hopefully.

"Not all of them. I'm going to try to continue covering the Harpies at least, but if I need to get someone to fill in for me, I will."

"Don't pretend you actually care about what I'm doing," James said hotly. "You're just doing this because you can, because you're Ginny Potter, Quidditch star. You don't want the bad press if someone starts talking about how I've screwed up. This isn't about anything more than that."

Her face flushed, and she stepped into his space and glared up at him. "I do care about you—first, last, and always. This is about me trying to get through your thick skull because you don't seem to care about house points or detentions or letters from home. People were hurt, James, and you humiliated a very dear friend of our family who defended me and your dad more than once when we were in school, who is a bigger war heroine than anyone who was not at Hogwarts that last year could possibly understand. Not to mention that Minerva McGonagall is a powerful witch and a dedicated teacher who deserves your respect in her own right. I have rarely been ashamed of you, Jamie, but this week—this week has been something else."

James turned his back and stared out the dusty window. Everything was always about his parents, always about the stupid war. Even when they tried to make it about him, it never was.

"We have told you and told you this level of misbehavior will not be tolerated, and you have completely ignored us. I will not raise a son who does not show respect for others and for himself. You're a smart boy, James. You have the potential to be a good captain and a good Auror, but if you want either of those things, you're going to have to work for them. I don't want to take your broomstick; I don't want to take you off the team; I don't want to pull you out of Hogwarts and teach you at home—"

He spun around, staring at her.

"But I will do whatever it takes to make you realize this destructive behavior has to stop. Do you understand me?"

"I've got to go. Class is about to start."

"James?"

But he brushed past her, hard enough to make her stumble, and slammed the door as he left.

Ginny had not yet caught up when James entered the Charms classroom and took the seat Cameron had saved for him.

"What's going on?"

"She's come to follow me around. Says 'this level of misbehavior will not be tolerated,'" he mocked.

"For how long?"

"At least a couple of weeks."

"Weeks?"

It was a relief to see his own horror mirrored on his best mate's face.

"But she's not taking my broomstick," James said quickly. "Not yet, at least."

"Well, that's something. Where is she now?"

James shrugged. "I left her in an empty classroom on the first floor. Didn't say which lesson I had next." He pulled out his textbook and wand.

"Uh-oh," Cameron muttered. "Here she comes."

Professor Viridian did not look surprised to see Ginny Potter enter his classroom, but then news traveled fast at Hogwarts, and James's mother was definitely news.

"She doesn't look very happy," Cameron added.

"Not happy" was an understatement. Ginny cut through a group of chattering Hufflepuffs like a dragon through dry timber, strode down the aisle, and wedged herself onto what little of the bench remained open beside James. His first thought was to bump her onto the floor, but she caught his eye, and her expression practically begged him. _Go on, do it. I dare you._

James slid closer to Cameron. One thing his mother did not do was bluff.


	3. Chapter 3

_Friday noon_

_the Great Hall_

Well, one thing was certain: Ginny didn't have to worry about gaining weight on the Hogwarts food as long as James was determined to shake her off. She had to jog to keep up, but keep up she did—through the packed corridors (where her smaller size was actually an advantage), down three flights of stairs at breakneck speed, and into the Great Hall. He almost lost her at the tables; she was heading for the one farthest from the door, but the boys turned down the aisle between the first and second tables and sat down at what had been the Ravenclaw table.

Fred's body had lain just feet from here….

Ginny shook off the memory and addressed her son. "You didn't tell me the Gryffindor table had moved."

James gave her a funny look. "It hasn't." He seemed to regret breaking his hour of silence and clamped his mouth shut again.

Of course. So some things had changed after all. Ginny allowed Cameron to sit between herself and James and scanned the pupils' uniforms to figure out the placement of the other tables. There was Lily, behind her and closer to the staff table, so the Slytherin table hadn't moved. Hufflepuff was the same too, Ginny realized, and Ravenclaw had taken Gryffindor's place at the far wall. So the snakes and the lions were side by side, she mused, plopping a large spoonful of mash onto her plate and looking over her shoulder again. She had to admire McGonagall's nerve; it was disconcerting to sit with hundreds of Slytherins out of sight right behind her.

How different from the night Pansy Parkinson had tried to turn Harry in to Voldemort and the Slytherins abandoned the school.

Ginny glanced over her shoulder at her daughter again, who was chatting animatedly with friends. Lily had always seemed happy in Slytherin House, but it felt good for Ginny to see the evidence for herself. It was hard to resist the temptation to go talk to Lily, but Ginny meant what she had said to McGonagall earlier: this was James's punishment, not Al's and Lily's. She had a letter for them in her pocket that she would give to Neville later this afternoon. They knew she was here, and Ginny's hair was as distinctive as her daughter's. Lily and Al would find her if they wanted to.

"… free period," Cameron said. "We'll lose her at the common room. She doesn't know the password."

Ginny smiled at Al as he passed her and clung to the tiny smile he gave her in return as he walked on by without stopping. She didn't belong here. This was her children's world, not hers. Not anymore.

"It's all right, Mrs. Potter."

Ginny looked up to see Cecelia Longbottom sitting down across from her.

"Al isn't trying to hurt your feelings. He's just trying to be cool, and you can't do that by having lunch with your mum instead of your friends."

"I suppose not," Ginny said, smiling at the girl. She was cute and bubbly just like her mother had been at fifteen, right down to the rosy cheeks and blonde pigtails. "How are you, CeCe?"

"Not very good at Vanishing Spells, apparently," she said. "We started on snails today, and I was partnered with Rose. Mine just went a little pale, but hers lost its shell. She's really good."

"You didn't choose a partner from Gryffindor?" Ginny said curiously. Rose, her niece, was a Ravenclaw.

"Sometimes, but most of the time Professor Burke mixes up the Houses. She says we can learn from each other's strengths and weaknesses."

"That's smart. How's Frank?" CeCe's older brother was a seventh-year Gryffindor, but Ginny hadn't seen him yet.

CeCe shrugged. "He's around here somewhere. I try to stay out of his way because he's always with Louis."

CeCe introduced Ginny to her friends, and she spent a pleasant lunch conversing with the girls and eavesdropping on James. His language was rather more … colorful … than she officially approved of, but he _was_ a sixteen-year-old boy and enough like his father to indulge in small acts of defiance wherever possible. Ginny said nothing. This was not one of the battles that had brought her to Hogwarts.

()()()()

James and Cameron left the Gryffindor table while Ginny was still talking with the girls around her.

"Come on," James urged, shooting a glance behind him as they exited into the Entrance Hall. "We've got to get behind the first tapestry before she sees us."

Cameron lengthened his stride, and the boys took the marble staircase two at a time. On up to the second floor, down the hall, and behind the tapestry of a medieval fox hunt. Up and around, using shortcuts and passages they had found with the assistance of the Marauder's Map, they wound their way to the seventh floor. They were just congratulating themselves on their success when they turned the last corner and saw Ginny lounging against the wall beside the Fat Lady's portrait.

Both boys stopped short in surprise.

"Mum? How the—how did you get up here so fast?" James changed his phrasing at the last minute.

"I'll admit it's been a while, but I've spent more time in this castle than you have." She turned to face the Fat Lady. "May I come in?"

The Fat Lady beamed at her. "Ginny Weasley. Of course you can, of course."

"Actually, it's Potter now."

If possible, the Fat Lady's smile widened. "Of course it is. I've been hoping you would come to see me since I heard you'd arrived in the castle. Come in, please."

James stuck out his hand to hold the portrait closed. "She can't. She hasn't given you the password."

The Fat Lady's smile vanished. "I am the guardian of Gryffindor Tower, Mr. Potter, not you, and I determine who may enter it. Not only is your mother a true Gryffindor in every sense of the word, if it were not for your parents, there wouldn't even _be_ a Hogwarts. You, on the other hand, need a password. What is it?"

His mother was making a rather poor attempt to hide her smile.

"Bonfire toffee," James snarled, and the Fat Lady swung forward.

Among the pupils enjoying the last free minutes before afternoon lessons began were the rest of the sixth year boys, who had been waiting for their arrival. They waved James over to their table with such enthusiasm he could not pretend not to notice.

Evan Gwyther spoke up first. "Aren't you going to introduce us?"

"This is my mum," James said, dropping into the open chair beside the window and ignoring his mother's reproving look when he didn't name any of his classmates.

"Ginny Potter," she said, shaking Evan's hand and taking the seat across from him as Cameron took the last seat beside her.

"We know. Nate Towler. My dad, Kenneth, went to school with your brothers."

"Which ones?"

"Fred and George."

"I'm so sorry," Ginny said sincerely, and the boys laughed. James crossed his arms and stared out the window.

"And you are?" Ginny turned to the dark-haired boy on her other side.

"Sam Burton," he said quietly, not quite looking at her.

"Chaser, right? You scored seven goals in last year's match against Ravenclaw, including the one that created the lead that allowed Holly Jordan to catch the Snitch and win the Cup for Gryffindor."

Sam was so surprised he actually did look at Ginny. "Y-y-yes."

James scoffed. Bet she didn't remember any of his match statistics.

"Yes, Jamie, I know how many goals you scored in that match, and every other one you've ever flown in. Want to quiz me?"

He turned away from watching Hagrid in his pumpkin patch long enough to shoot his mother a dirty look.

"I'm sorry," she said to the other boys, and James's stomach gave a guilty squirm as she tucked her hair behind one pink ear. "He's rather mad at me at the moment."

"I thought it was the other way round," Evan said.

"Oh, it is," Ginny assured him. "But it's not possible to out-sulk a teenager. Besides, I'm here to harass Jamie, not interfere with the rest of you, so you boys just do whatever you normally do." She smiled, and all four boys smiled back at her. Even shy Sam.

James shot his mother another, longer, dirtier look. The last thing he needed was for anyone to think she was _flirting_.

()()()()

Ginny checked her watch and turned around to suggest to James that they get going, but his seat was empty. A quick glance confirmed he had left the common room without her. She entered the girls' dormitories, made a quick stop in the first floor bathroom, and climbed through the portrait hole. She paused at the end of the Fat Lady's corridor, considering going back to the guest quarters for her cloak, but she did not want to give James the satisfaction of being late to class.

It was cool but sunny as Ginny crossed the grounds towards the greenhouses. She couldn't really blame James for trying to ditch her, but forcing her to chase him all over the castle and grounds simply amplified her presence. The group of Ravenclaws and Gryffindors heading her way, first- or second-years by the looks of them, positively tripped over each other in their efforts to slow down and see where she was going. Which she didn't know herself; she knew James's timetable, and she had been able to find him in Defense Against the Dark Arts and Charms because those classrooms had not changed locations since she had been a pupil, but she didn't know which of the five greenhouses he would be in. As the kids made their way across the vegetable gardens, Neville exited and crossed to greenhouse four.

Ginny focused on the glasshouse and the thought of her disobedient son inside, nurturing her anger and frustration to carry her past the spot where Voldemort had taunted them with Harry's dead body, past where Alice Tolipan had died as Ginny and Neville transferred her to a stretcher, past where the first Death Eater Ginny had stunned had been eaten by an Acromantula.

She pushed open the greenhouse door and sighed at the warmth. The sun heated the building to a comfortable temperature, and it was pleasantly humid and fragrant. Neville must be a popular teacher; there were no less than thirty pupils already assembled from all four houses. The room went silent for several seconds, long enough for James to look around and scowl at her, and then the buzz of conversation resumed in earnest.

"You might as well stop running away from me," Ginny said, shoving James's schoolbag off the bench and sitting down. "I know your timetable."

"McGonagall gave you a copy, did she?"

"No," Ginny said, looking up in surprise. "I have it memorized."

James frowned. "How did you do that?"

"You wrote it down for me. At the beginning of the year. I always ask for your timetable, remember?"

He stared at her, and Ginny was puzzled by his confusion.

"Every year, James. I feel closer to you if I know where you are and what you're doing when I think of you." She smiled. "Surely you didn't think I just put you on the train and forgot all about you?"

"Pretty much," he muttered, picking up his bag and pulling out his dragon hide gloves.

"Jamie," she said, stricken.

"Stop calling me that!"

Ginny swallowed her hurt and faced forward as Neville walked in front of a large table, and the class gave him their attention.

"Let's go ahead and talk about what everyone wants to know, shall we? We have a guest with us today, Mrs. Ginny Potter."

Ginny didn't need to look at James to know he was glaring at Neville; she could feel the resentment radiating off James and was relieved he had a different target, however briefly.

How could he think she didn't miss him?

"Yes, she played Chaser for the Holyhead Harpies—"

A few cheers and Ginny smiled automatically.

"Yes, she's a Quidditch reporter for the_ Daily Prophet_, and yes, she holds an Order of Merlin as a founding member of Dumbledore's Army and defender at the Battle of Hogwarts—"

A murmur of interest passed through the group, and she heard one boy ask his friend about Dumbledore's Army.

"But today she's just here as James's mum. Even if she was my date to the Yule Ball."

The class laughed and appraised her with fresh curiosity. Caught by surprise, Ginny felt herself blushing as Neville winked at her. He knew. He knew James was being dead awful, and he was trying to cheer her up. She gave him a small smile.

"Now." Neville clapped his hands together and indicated a line of gnarled stumps along one side of the greenhouse. "Mrs. Potter, I seem to recall you achieved a N.E.W.T. in Herbology. Can you identify these plants for us, please?"

The rest of Friday dragged interminably. Ginny continued to follow James but made no further efforts to talk to him. She sat alone in the common room after dinner, watching as each of her sons visited with his friends. Normally she would have found it interesting, watching James and Al in separate social groups when they teamed up so often at home, but the boys remained united in their Let's Pretend Mum Doesn't Exist campaign. While she certainly hadn't expected to be welcomed with open arms, she hadn't expected to be so thoroughly shunned, either.

Maybe she was too used to being famous.

Her Gryffindor nieces and nephews—well, niece and nephews; Roxie was the only Weasley girl in Gryffindor now that Victoire had left—stopped by her chair to say hello, but it was obvious they were only responding to their friends' demands for introductions. Ginny smiled politely but didn't involve the kids in conversation as she usually would, and group by group, the Gryffindors wandered off to their own pursuits. When curfew arrived, Ginny said goodnight to James (who ignored her, even though his friends looked up uncomfortably) and climbed out of the portrait hole to make her way to her guest room.

Anticipating that James, who liked a good lie-in as much as Ron always had, would rise early on Saturday in an attempt to avoid her, Ginny set her alarm for half an hour before breakfast began and was waiting in the common room when James left his dormitory. He followed her without protest, and they ate the entire meal in silence—an echoing, oppressive silence that was only broken when two Ravenclaw girls entered the otherwise empty Great Hall, their rucksacks already stuffed for a visit to the library.

Ginny had brought her handbag with her this time, and when James returned to the boys' dormitory, she chose her favorite table by the window and spread out her work. James woke from his nap in time to join his friends for lunch but did not follow them onto the grounds, and he declined Al's offer to play Quidditch when they met him on the way back to Gryffindor Tower after dinner. James disappeared to his dormitory for the third time, and Ginny was about to despair of spending any decent time with him today when he returned with an armful of books and sat down at the opposite corner of her table.

Ginny abandoned her notes (she had three articles outlined, but she could only write so much when she hadn't observed the team practices) and studied James instead. He was a good pupil, having earned eight O.W.L.s and even scraping an Acceptable in History of Magic. She wondered what had caused him to botch the essay for Neville last week.

"Stop staring." He didn't look up or even stop writing.

"I miss you," she said quietly. "It's horrible having you right here and not talking to you."

He spared her a cold glance. "It's horrible having you here at all."

"Well, good!" Ginny snapped, slamming her hands on the table as she stood up. "It's supposed to be horrible, James, but I have to say, your immense immaturity is not helping!"

People were staring. She took a deep breath and sat back down, gathering her notes into a stack.

James's quill scratched on. Ginny's fingers itched to snatch it out of his hands. He was so like Harry, and in the most annoying ways….

* * *

a/n: Thanks to Hippothestrowl for pointing me to the DA signature list in the OotP movie as a source for the name of the girl Ginny is assisting when Harry passes her on his way to the Forbidden Forest.


	4. Chapter 4

_Saturday evening_

_the dungeons_

Ginny and James entered Professor Fawley's classroom to find both the professor and Lily inside.

"Lily!" Ginny said in delight. "Hello, pixie."

"Hi, Mum."

Lily returned her hug, even leaned into it, and Ginny took solace in the reassurance that at least one of her children still liked her.

"What are you doing here?"

"Professor Longbottom gave us your notes, and I knew James had detention tonight, so I thought this would be a good place to meet. It's just around the corner from my common room, so if anyone sees me coming or going, they won't think anything about it."

Liked her, but didn't want to be seen with her. Ginny smothered a sigh and reminded herself she'd behaved the same way at thirteen.

Professor Fawley set James to scrubbing cauldrons at the back of the classroom, and the witches sat down to a nice mother-daughter gossip session. Ginny was just thinking the only thing missing was a tray of tea and biscuits when one appeared on the professor's desk, and he carried it over to them. Lily smiled at her teacher, who smiled back. Reassured by this demonstration of goodwill between her daughter and her Head of House, Ginny thanked the professor and began to pour as he returned to his office off the classroom. She learned that Lily's lessons were going well (with her current favorite being the unicorns in Care of Magical Creatures), admired the flower button pinned to her daughter's lapel (that had once been an oak leaf and now shimmered in shades of green, silver, and purple), and discovered that all the Slytherins wanted to know if she knew where the Chamber of Secrets was.

"What? How do they know about that?"

Lily rolled her eyes and popped another sugar biscuit into her mouth. "Everyone's been checking out Rita Skeeter's _Harry: The Hogwarts Years._ I keep telling them it's not nice to remind someone of almost being eaten by a great giant snake, but all the boys think it's really cool."

Ginny opened her mouth to say that Slytherins were not known for being nice, then remembered she and Harry had vowed not to rag on Slytherin House after Lily was Sorted there.

But damn, it was hard.

Not to mention hearing the Chamber of Secrets tossed out like that. Lily still knew only the censored version: Ginny had been tricked by a boy called Tom into entering the Chamber, and Harry and Ron had gone to save her from the basilisk.

"So, do you?"

Ginny returned her attention to her daughter. "Yes, I do. No, I cannot get in, and no, I would not show you if I could." She took a sip of tea and asked the next question as casually as possible. "Have you read Skeeter's book?"

Lily made a rude noise. "Please. I already know more than anybody else, and anyway, it's not just Dad. Even Aunt Hermione doesn't like Rita Skeeter's books. I mean, if Aunt Hermione can't be bothered, why should I?"

Ginny laughed. "Oh, Lils, I've really missed you."

Lily smiled and took a drink of her own tea. "How long are you staying?"

Ginny's face fell and she glanced to the back of the classroom, where James was now scrubbing the gargoyle faucets with a toothbrush. "That," she said rather grimly, "depends on your brother."

"Good, you'll be here for the first Quidditch match then."

"I don't think I can stay until November."

"But it's not November! We're having an inter-house scrimmage three weeks from now, and I'm Seeker for Slytherin and Gryffindor," she said proudly.

"That's gr—wait, for Slytherin _and_ Gryffindor?"

"Uh-huh." Lily nodded eagerly. "Snakes and lions versus badgers and eagles. It's going to be epic!"

Ginny was so shocked that she fell back on her standby reporter question. "What are your thoughts on the upcoming match?"

"Everyone's super-excited, and nobody can say that James picked me because I'm his sister because the captains agreed on special tryouts—twice the players for the positions available, you know, because the teams are combined—"

Ginny nodded dumbly, still stuck on the idea of Gryffindor and Slytherin playing Quidditch _together._ It was like—like—like a wizard playing for the Harpies. It just wasn't _done_!

"—and I caught the Snitch before Holly did."

That would be Holly Jordan, Gryffindor's Seeker for the third year. Ginny's professional experience in sorting and processing players and teams was starting to kick in.

"So who else is Chaser besides James?"

"Burton and Derrick."

She nodded again. Bradley Derrick was in James's year and a versatile player, having once switched position to Keeper to cover injuries for the Slytherin team.

"Freddie and Miles as Beaters—you don't know him, he's new this year—"

Ginny filed this information for future reference.

"And Hugo is Keeper. Four Gryffindors and three Slytherins," Lily added. "That's why the captains agreed on special tryouts, because it's impossible to do equal numbers from each house. The 'Claws and 'Puffs aren't as evenly split, though."

Ginny's brain was finally catching on to the most important implication of this news. "This means I can cheer for you and James at the same time!"

"You always cheer for me and James at the same time. We play different positions."

"Thank Merlin. But this time a win for one of you will be a win for both of you."

Lily beamed. "I know. Cool, huh? It was James and Hugo's idea, and they got Louis behind it as Head Boy. None of the four teams really stand out this year, and they thought it would be a good way to generate interest in the matches and promote inter-house unity at the same time."

"If that's the case, why not mix the teams up completely? Have members from all four houses on each team?" Now that she had got over her initial shock, the strategy of the idea was quite intriguing.

"Because the strong players and the weak players are different positions in most of the houses, and we wouldn't be evenly matched," Lily explained. "James and Derrick weren't thrilled about co-captaining, but this split makes for the best teams. Please say you'll stay that long!"

"Well, even if I'm not still here, I'll come back for the scrimmage," Ginny promised. "It will be between the pro exhibitions and the first League matches."

"Now that," Lily said with a grin, "was my idea. Have an entertaining event during a lull in the season, keep the fans interested, and maximize press coverage."

Ginny gave her a high-five. "That's my girl."

()()()()

_Sunday morning_

_the Great Hall_

Ginny stood up and waved with both arms. "Jamie! Jamie, over here!"

James looked like he was considering making a run for it, so Ginny stepped up onto the bench and waved more vigorously.

She was starting to really like Cameron Davies. Any kid that would stick with a friend whose mother was acting this ridiculous deserved an award.

"You don't mind, do you, Cameron?" Ginny sidestepped him and pulled James down beside her. "Here you go. I have your plate all ready." She slid the plate with eggs, toast with a light layer of marmalade, and bacon in his direction. "Tea or juice?"

"I'll get it." His voice was barely audible.

"No, let me. Pumpkin juice?" She poured a glass without waiting for his nod. "Eat up. Breakfast is the most important meal of the day." She countered James's glare with her brightest "mothers know best" smile and returned to her own breakfast. If James had found her behavior offensive so far, he was in for a surprise today. Ginny was tired of being ignored. He was a smart kid; he'd cotton on.

"What are we doing today?"

James shrugged.

"Quidditch?" she said hopefully.

He shook his head.

"Why not?" He hadn't played yesterday, either. "Neville said practice had started. Isn't there one this weekend?"

He shook his head again, swallowed, and said, "Homework."

Ginny raised one brow. "Didn't you finish your Potions last night?"

"But I still have Herbology, Charms, and DADA."

Ginny snuck a bite of bacon. "Well, why don't you get your books, and we can work outside?"

"Too cold."

She frowned. Did he _want_ to spend another day shut up in Gryffindor Tower?

"Let's go." He had bolted down his breakfast and was already making his way down the table, Cameron following with a stack of bacon sandwiches.

Ginny took a last gulp of tea and trotted after them. Boys and their long legs—she could just see their cloaks whipping around the corner at the top of the marble staircase. She crossed the Entrance Hall to the location of a hidden staircase the DA had used in her sixth year. She climbed it, cut through a passageway, and caught up with the boys on the fourth floor. She looped her arm around James's and hung on tightly.

"Don't want to lose you again, do I?"

Ginny spent the rest of the day being as annoying and obnoxious as possible. She straightened James's collar, ruffled his hair, scolded him for the dirt on his schoolbag and the scuffs on his shoes, looked over his shoulder to correct his spelling, and generally treated him as if he were six years old again. When she tried to cut his meat at lunch, even Cameron gave up, shooting James an apologetic look and turning to chat with Nate instead. Every so often, Ginny smiled in Al's direction just for the pure pleasure of seeing him blanch and turn away. It was nearly tea time when James announced he had another detention.

Ginny followed him through the castle and waited as Padma Patil Goldstein set him up with a stack of first- and second-year papers.

"Knock on the door when you've finished marking those, Potter."

"Yes, Professor."

Ginny ruffled his hair again on her way past, felt the scorching glare between her shoulder blades, and entered Padma's private quarters.

Neville met her with a glass of wine. "How's it going?"

Ginny took it gratefully and sank down into a chintz chair with a sigh. "He hates me."

"He doesn't hate you," Neville and Padma said together.

"No, I think he does."

"You were pretty embarrassing at breakfast," Padma said.

"I was tired of being ignored. I'm perfectly willing to work out some arrangement to make this less awkward for both of us, but he won't even speak to me. I knew he wasn't going to like me coming up here, but it's like he was angry with me before I even showed up, and I have no idea what I'm supposed to have done."

"When did it start?" Padma said, sitting down across from Ginny.

She thought back. "When his O.W.L. results were posted in the _Prophet_. Harry and I both threw a fit, but the damage was already done."

"They were perfectly respectable O.W.L.s," Neville said.

"We couldn't have been more pleased. But the fact remains that of all the fifth- and seventh-years who sat their exams last year, only James's marks were printed, and Harry and I made enough noise that Al's and Lily's probably won't be. And James's marks may well be the best of the three, but no one will know because his were the only ones made public, so he gets shafted twice. I used to think Bill was exaggerating when he said he had it the hardest as the oldest child, but it is different." Ginny took another drink. "Harry and I do our best to treat them fairly, but we expect more of James. I know we do."

"Why do you think that set him off?" Padma said. "He's received special treatment before, and as Neville said, they were good marks."

Ginny flung her hands out. If she had not already drank most of her wine, it would have spilled. "I have no idea! I keep trying to get him alone so we can talk, but he won't go anywhere with me. He doesn't want to play Quidditch, he doesn't want to walk around the lake, he doesn't even want to revise in the library." She blinked at the remains of her glass.

"I can explain that," Neville said. "McGonagall confined him to Gryffindor Tower except for lessons and meals. And detentions, of course."

"What?"

"She cancelled Quidditch practice for a week and suspended his prefect duties until further notice, and she made James tell the team and the other prefects."

"But why didn't he tell me? I could have—"

"Maybe that's the point," Padma said. "Maybe he doesn't want you fighting his battles for him."

"I'm his mother!"

"I know, Ginny," Padma said soothingly. "But maybe he's upset by the—the attention you draw. Or that he draws as your son. Forgive me, but nobody cares about James's O.W.L. results. They care about Harry and Ginny Potter's son's results."

"But I can't help that." Ginny spoke through gritted teeth. "We are who we are and it just _is_."

"You know teenagers." Padma grinned. "Always thinking they can change the system. James comes by that honestly on both sides."

"I reckon so."

"I know so," Neville said firmly. "What have you told him about the war?"

"More than Lily," Ginny admitted. "But … not everything."

"Maybe you should," Neville said. "Share some of the things that happened during your sixth year."

Ginny twirled the stem of her goblet, staring at the sheen of claret in its center. "Ever since that first lunch, I can't sit on the near side of the Gryffindor table. I can't eat with my back to the Slytherins—it gives me the creeps. I kept glancing over my shoulder, and then I would see Lily, and—" She swallowed.

Padma squeezed her hand. "It was hard for all of us, coming back."

"I did it seventh year," Ginny said stubbornly.

"That was years ago. Being here probably brings up old memories you haven't thought of in a long time," Padma said.

"Talk to James, Ginny," Neville said. "I'll speak to McGonagall about letting him out of Gryffindor Tower if he's with you."

"No, don't," Ginny said. "Padma's right. That will make him more angry—he'll think I'm arranging special treatment. I'll—I don't know. I'll think of something."

"Talk to him now," Padma said. "I was planning on having him work on his DADA homework when he gets done with those papers. Neville and I will clear out and leave you two alone."

"Thanks, Padma."

"A well-behaved James is in all our best interests."

When Ginny returned to the classroom, James's voice was acid. "Tired of talking about me?"

She sat down at the table next to his. "I thought maybe we could talk, just the two of us, without any of your friends around."

He flipped a few pages in his textbook. "Unless you're telling me you're leaving, I'm not interested."

"Jamie, what—"

"And stop calling me that!" he shouted, shoving his quill into the ink pot so hard she heard the tip snap. "I'm not a baby!"

"You're doing a fine imitation of it!" Ginny glared back at him but relented first. "I don't want to fight with you. Please, will you tell me why you're so angry with me? I think it's about more than me being here."

He pressed his lips together and said nothing, digging in his bag for another quill.

"I can't apologize or fix it if you don't tell me what it is," she coaxed.

"I don't need you to fix everything." He cast an Impervius Charm on the broken quill so it wouldn't drip all over the desk, then banished it to the bin. "I'm not a little kid anymore, Mum."

Ginny looked at her son, really looked at him. He was taller than she (he had been for a few years) and broad-shouldered, a little stockier than Harry had been at that age. _Sixteen_. When Harry was sixteen, he'd been researching Horcruxes with Dumbledore. When she was sixteen, she'd been tortured for her participation in a resistance movement. James's dark hair was slightly mussed, as if he'd tried to finger-comb it, and the faintest shadow of stubble lined his jaw. No, not a baby, or even a boy—_young man_, she corrected herself. Her oldest child, the first baby she'd ever carried inside, was nearly grown. She swallowed hard.

"All right," she agreed, grateful she had vetoed Neville's idea to speak to McGonagall. "Then tell me what the problem is."

He scowled but accepted the challenge. "You're making it all worse. Al, Louis, Hugo—even Lily. The whole family is treating me like I have spattergroit, and everyone else wants to be my friend just to meet you. It's embarrassing. Why can't you just go home and let me do my detentions and—and everything? Nobody else's mum comes to Hogwarts when they get in trouble."

"Nobody else put six people in the hospital wing," Ginny retorted.

"That was an accident!"

"I certainly hope so!"

"You didn't give me a chance," James said. "Your said you would come up here if I did anything else, but I'd already played the prank on McGonagall when I got the Howler. It wasn't fair." He crossed his arms.

"Neville said he'd been cutting you as much slack as he could, and you admitted there were incidents I don't know about. You know good and well we don't tolerate anything that could hurt other people, and you had to know we would never approve of you pranking Professor McGonagall. For Godric's sake, James, your father wanted to come up here and yank you out of bed himself! Then he was going to send a Patronus, and when I convinced him not to do that, he wanted to send a Howler. I had to give the parchment to Hermione to hide! If he knew the way you have been treating me over the last three days, he _would_ be here. Don't sit there and pretend you're unjustly accused. If we've received one letter since you started Hogwarts, we've received a hundred. This is just—just—misbehavior one hundred and one!"

"You won't let him do that, will you?" James said anxiously. "You'll make sure Dad doesn't come up here?"

"That's up to you. You have the power to keep your dad at home, and you have the power to send me back there. But running away and mouthing off is not going to do it."

He considered this. "Still, will you not tell him about this weekend?"

"Your dad and I don't keep secrets. You know that." James's face fell. "But I can downplay it, okay?"

He smiled at her for the first time since—since forever.

"Do me a favor?" Ginny said.

"What?"

"Stop taking the stairs two at a time. My legs are too short."

* * *

a/n: Surprise! I had a few really nice comments about my least favorite chapter (three), so I thought I'd post early. Also, any thoughts on update day? Is Wednesday still good or are weekends better? I know school's out (at least here) and people are involved in summer activities.

Unless I'm much mistaken, "pixie" as a nickname for Lily Luna comes from the wonderful My Dear Professor McGonagall, who is back from sabbatical abroad. Welcome home, Lucy!


	5. Chapter 5

_Sunday evening_

_Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom_

Ginny and James's newfound truce was tested immediately. As they exited the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom, they ran into a mob from all the houses, each one of them holding something for her to sign.

"Mrs. Potter, will you sign my Chocolate Frog card?"

"Mrs. Potter, my dad sent me his poster from when you were on the national team. Will you sign it for us?"

"James, ask your mum if she wants to come for a fly!"

"Yeah, ask her!"

James turned to her, stiff and angry again. "You want to know what the problem is? It's this!" He pointed to the group of pupils crowding around them. "You make everything worse, and it's always about you! _Always._" His voice cracked. "I don't want to be your son, and I don't want you for a mother!"

He turned and walked away, robes billowing, leaving Ginny standing alone in front of the now-silent pupils, who were tucking Chocolate Frog cards and posters and even copies of _Quidditch Weekly_ out of sight.

"I—excuse me. Excuse me, sorry..." Ginny ducked her head and pushed her way through the group, holding her breath to stop the tears.

()()()()

James took the long way back to Gryffindor Tower, hoping to avoid any more star-struck classmates and taking every staircase two or three at a time with relish. He stuffed down the guilt and regret whenever his mother's shocked face floated to the front of his mind and dwelt on the sense of resentment and injustice that had filled him upon seeing the crowd of his mother's fans. Harry would find out about this; maybe not because Ginny would tell him, but just because he would know she was upset. James knew he would be sorry later, when his dad showed up or chewed him out via a bloody talking stag, but right now he didn't care.

_Yes, you do. You wouldn't be angry if you didn't care._

He told his conscience to stuff it, reminded it everything was his mother's fault—

_You should have had better aim. If you had hit Holly's book bag, none of this would have ever happened._

And finally broke into a run. He gasped the password to the Fat Lady, climbed through the portrait hole, and sat down beside Cameron, who was playing chess with Al.

"Where's Mum?"

"How the hell should I know?"

"She's been all over you since she got here. What did you do to get her to leave you alone?" Al advanced his bishop.

"I told her to bugger off."

Cameron gave him a sharp look, but Al scoffed.

"No, you didn't. You'd be choking on soap bubbles if you'd told Mum to bugger off."

"Shut it," James muttered.

"Oh, there's a scathing reply."

"I mean it, Al, just shut it!"

Al captured Cameron's rook. "Fine, fine. No need to be stroppy. You're as bad as Lily these days."

James kicked him. Al moved around the corner of the table without retaliating. "No way. I'm not doing anything to make her pissed at me." He studied the chessboard as Cameron debated his move, then looked back at James. "You really don't know where she went?"

James shrugged. "Maybe to see Longbottom or owl Dad. Listen, I'm going to—" Where? He wasn't allowed out of the bloody Tower. "I'm going to write an essay."

Life sucked, and it was all his mother's fault.

()()()()

Ginny flew down the marble staircase, tore across the Entrance Hall so rapidly she had no trouble pushing open the heavy front doors, and tripped her way down the stone stairs. She ran without thinking or destination, ran away from the crowd of admirers, away from James, away from his hateful words. She was dodging her way through Hagrid's pumpkin patch when she was lifted clean off her feet.

"An' where yeh goin' in such a hurry? Ginny?" Hagrid set her down carefully. "Wha's the matter?"

"It's nothing." She wiped her face with one sleeve and gave a hearty sniff.

"Don' look like nuthin'," Hagrid said, steering her towards his cabin. "Come in, come in, I'll make us a cuppa."

Knowing it was useless to argue, Ginny climbed the steps to Hagrid's back door and sat down at the table, her feet dangling as they always did in the huge chairs.

"I heard yeh were here abou' James," Hagrid said. "Bin hopin' yeh'd come ter see me."

"I will. I mean, I would have. But James is being—so—" She took a deep breath. "So horrid, I didn't want to inflict his behavior on anyone else."

Hagrid set a steaming mug in front of her. "He the one who upset yeh?"

She nodded, clutching the drink in both hands.

"Well, now, boys say loads o' stupid things. They don' mean nuthin' by it."

"He said—" Ginny blinked rapidly and took another deep breath, but the band around her chest wouldn't loosen. "He said he didn't want me for a mother."

"Tha's rubbish," Hagrid said, patting her on the back and nearly knocking her off her chair. "Lucky ter have a mother, he is, an' 'specially one like you."

She shook her head, her grip on the mug unwavering. "He said I was just making everything worse, and I reckon he's right."

"Codswallop," Hagrid said stoutly. "Aw, now, don' cry." He fished out a tablecloth-sized handkerchief and passed it to her. "The Ginny Potter I know wouldn' let a sixteen-year-old whelp get the better o' her."

"He's just so angry, and he won't talk to me. He did a little, just now, but then we ran into a bunch of kids asking for my autograph and..." Ginny felt the tears well up and wiped her eyes again.

"You wan' I should talk ter him?"

She shook her head. "No, I don't want him to feel like all the adults in his life are ganging up on him. He should have someone he can talk to."

Hagrid made a noise in his throat and got up to stoke the fire. "I'd give anythin' ter have a mum when I was growin' up. Special, mothers are."

Ginny felt her lip tremble and bit down on it.

"Yeh wan' to Floo-call Harry?"

She shook her head.

"He'd wan' to know yeh were cryin'."

She shook her head again.

"Well, drink your tea, and we'll go fer a walk, visit the unicorn herd. Nuthin' like a baby animal ter make it seem all's righ' with the world."

()()()()

_Sunday evening_

_Gryffindor Common Room_

James was ignoring her again, and quite frankly, Ginny was relieved. He was chatting and cutting up with the rest of the sixth-year boys, who were drawing a lot of sidelong glances from many of the nearby girls, including CeCe Longbottom, Holly Jordan, and two other girls who were in some of James's lessons but Ginny hadn't met yet. She leaned towards Sam, who sat next to her at the end of the table.

"Who are those two girls with Holly Jordan?"

He didn't even need to look up. "Millie Sewell and Caitlin Ashcroft. They were—" He broke off, looking guilty.

Ginny raised one eyebrow.

Sam shot a look at James, who was acting out a Quidditch maneuver for Cameron and Nate's entertainment. "The firework landed in Millie's cauldron. She and Caitlin were burned the worst."

Ginny looked at the girls more closely. Both had their hair down, Millie wore a turtleneck, and Caitlin's left eyebrow was a little shorter than her right, but they seemed all right. Ginny wondered if James had ever apologized. Setting that thought aside for a more private time, she glanced at the scroll of parchment in front of Sam. She had two sons, three nephews, and a niece scattered about the room, but Sam was the only person who seemed willing to talk to her.

"What are you working on?"

"Muggle Studies."

Ginny decided to take Neville's advice and raised her voice slightly. "During my sixth year, Muggle Studies was compulsory. Ne—Professor Longbottom used to call it Bigot Studies."

"Why was that?"

James and Cameron were pretending not to listen, but the activity at the other end of the table had quieted considerably.

"It was part of Voldemort's plan for Hogwarts." She saw a few children within earshot flinch at the name, but no one protested. "An attempt to indoctrinate us into believing that pure-bloods and half-bloods were better than Muggle-borns, but I knew better."

"How?" Evan said. Most of the nearby pupils were setting down quills and turning in their chairs to eavesdrop, including Al and Hugo.

"Because one of my best friends was Muggle-born, and she was the brightest witch Hogwarts had seen in decades."

"My mum," Hugo said.

"That's right." Ginny smiled.

"My dad said Muggle-borns weren't allowed at Hogwarts during the war," Nate said. "Something about having to register?"

"The Muggle-born Registration Commission," Ginny said. "Run by a hateful old bat who had been our Defense Against the Dark Arts professor, Delores Umbridge." Even now, the name tasted bad in her mouth. "She was the inspiration for Dumbledore's Army."

A murmur of interest passed through the group, and several pupils dragged their chairs closer. Apparently, word about the DA had spread since Neville's comment in Herbology.

"How's that, Mrs. Potter?" Frank Longbottom knew the answer to that question, but he knew everyone else wanted to know too.

"She wouldn't let us practice magic," Ginny said simply. "We sat and read the textbook every day. It was Harry, Ron, and Hermione's O.W.L. year, and they weren't going to get a chance to practice the spells until their practical exam."

Several of the older pupils, including Louis, gasped.

Ginny grinned. "That's what Hermione thought, so she came up with the idea of meeting on their own, in secret, to learn the spells."

"No, Harry Potter started the DA," Holly Jordan said. "My dad said so, and he was there."

"So was I," Ginny said, as un-snootily as possible. Lee would get a kick out of his daughter arguing with her. "Harry set the meetings and taught the lessons, but it was Hermione's idea. It took her weeks to convince him."

"Was he afraid to break the rules?" Millie asked.

"Of course not. Harry just didn't see himself as a leader then. It was the DA that taught him that, I think."

"What about Muggle Studies?" Sam said quietly.

"What about it?"

"You said Longbottom used to call them Bigot Studies. What did they teach you?"

Ginny snorted. "My sixth-year Muggle Studies lessons were an exercise in keeping your mouth shut. Rubbish about pure bloodlines and Muggles as animals. How torturing or killing them wasn't really a crime because they weren't even human. Our previous teacher had disappeared over the summer, and the new teacher tried to make it like she was just too stupid to show up for the start of a new school year. We found out later, during the Death Eater trials, that Professor Burbage was murdered by Voldemort himself."

"Because she taught Muggle Studies?"

"Because she taught that Muggles were people worthy of respect, and Muggle-born wizards were just as clever and capable as wizards with magical families."

"Who was your new teacher? Was she a pure-blood?"

"Yes. Her name was Alecto Carrow, and she was a Death Eater."

There were more than gasps this time as pupils cried out in shock and protest and some of the girls covered their mouths with their hands.

"There were three Death Eaters at Hogwarts that year: Alecto; her brother Amycus, who taught what became simply the Dark Arts; and Headmaster Severus Snape." Ginny smiled at Al. "Of course, we didn't know then that Snape was loyal to Dumbledore and Harry."

"What was it like?" Finally, James joined the conversation.

"Being taught by Death Eaters?"

He nodded.

Ginny took note of the younger pupils within earshot, including twelve-year-old Roxie. "We were punished harshly for simple things, like being late or running out of ink. Magic was used against us, and dark magic was no longer forbidden. We were missing Muggle-born friends and classmates with no idea where they were or if they were safe. No news was good news then; if Muggle-borns appeared in the news, they were either dead or sent to Azkaban."

"Why?" Roxie said. "What did they do?"

"That's the point, Roxie," Ginny said gently. "They didn't do anything. Voldemort made it a crime to be Muggle-born. He said—through the Minister of Magic, who was Imperiused—he said the Department of Mysteries had discovered that the only way to obtain magic was to be born with it, and if a witch or wizard could not provide evidence of another witch or wizard in their genealogy, then they were guilty of stealing magic."

"But that doesn't make sense," said one of Hugo's friends. "What about Squibs?"

"I told you it was rubbish," Ginny said.

"All right," Louis said. "That's curfew for all you fourth-years and below. Go on, now." Amid much groaning and complaining, he shepherded the younger pupils up the stairs to the dormitories. When the stairwell doors closed, he sat down and leaned forward. "Tell us about DADA."

Ginny shook her head. "Nice try, Louis, but I'm not going to have everyone's parents sending _me_ Howlers. You will have to talk to your own parents."

"Come on, Mrs. Potter, can't you tell us something?" Evan said.

"Well, I do know it was McGonagall who captured the Carrows the night of the Final Battle," she said. "In Ravenclaw Tower. I wasn't there, but Harry and Luna—Luna Lovegood was a Ravenclaw in my year and another member of the DA—they said she strung them up and left them dangling in nets in mid-air. Cool as a cucumber about it too, like she was demonstrating Switching Spells for first-years."

"Was she your teacher?"

"I had her for Transfiguration all seven years. She taught all of my brothers and Harry and Hermione too. And Neville."

"What was she like?"

"She was the best," Ginny said affectionately. "Tough but fair, McGonagall was. Head of Gryffindor and a big Quidditch fan."

"No way!"

"You watch. I bet she hides it better now that she's Headmistress, but she roots for Gryffindor. She recommended Harry for the team and bought him his first broomstick." Ginny smiled at the incredulous faces surrounding her and turned to the Head Boy. "Don't you have a prefects' meeting to lead?"

Prefect meetings were, as Ginny had always suspected, dull and boring. Louis introduced her, announced the first Hogsmeade visit of the year and distributed flyers to be posted in the common rooms, and moved to the week's patrol schedule.

"James, any word on when you can resume your duties?"

He shook his head.

"Ask Longbottom next time you see him, okay? The Gryffindors covered for James last week. Can I get another house to volunteer this time?"

The silence stretched uncomfortably.

"All right then, sixth years, you're up."

Caitlin, the female Gryffindor sixth year prefect, frowned at James. He shrugged and mouthed "sorry." If the Gryffindors had taken James's rounds last week, this would be Caitlin's second week of extra duties, plus a night in the hospital wing.

Ginny thought he owed her rather more than an apology.

It took a few minutes to rework the schedule around the sixth years' other extracurricular activities. The Head Girl answered Rose's question about points infractions, and the meeting broke up as two Slytherins left for nightly rounds.

Ginny followed the remaining Gryffindors as the pupils from other houses split off in different directions. James's classmates from all the houses had made their displeasure with him known either by word or deed, and for the first time since she had received Neville's letter last Tuesday, Ginny felt a twinge of sympathy for her son. He trailed silently behind the chattering group, head down and hands in his pockets. Perhaps McGonagall's punishment was making an impact when nothing else had.


	6. Chapter 6

_Sunday night_

_Gryffindor Common Room_

Ginny climbed through the portrait hole and was not surprised to find most of the older pupils still gathered in the common room. She resumed her seat next to Sam as James rejoined his friends. Most of the Gryffindors had put away their books and were indulging in last-minute gossip before the beginning of another week of lessons. Ginny was worn out by the emotions of the day and more than ready to call it a night when James turned down Nate's offer of a game of gobstones, saying he was going to take a shower.

She let him get almost to the stairs before calling loudly, "Don't forget to wash behind your ears, Jamie!"

He flashed her a two-fingered salute. Ginny was halfway to the boys' dormitory before she was conscious of moving.

Louis blocked her path. "You can't go up there."

"I've been in the boys' dormitories loads of times!"

Louis winced.

"For Merlin's sake," she said impatiently. "I'm his mother, not some boy-crazy teenager. Get out of my way, Louis."

"I really can't do that."

Ginny crossed her arms and fixed Louis with the same glare she used to give him years ago when he woke a sleeping baby or tricked the younger boys into doing his chores. He shifted his weight uncomfortably but didn't move. She pointed up the stairs.

"Did you see what he did? He only did that because he thinks I can't follow him."

"You can't."

"Why ever not?"

Louis looked pained. "Please don't make me explain that, Aunt Ginny."

She sighed. "Fine. Go upstairs and tell him to get down here, now."

He hesitated.

"It's me or you, Louis."

"The dormitory is the one place James has in this whole castle to get away from you. Can't you give him a break?"

Ginny simply looked up—way up—at her nephew and let him read the answer in her expression.

She was prepared for James to ignore her, or at least keep her waiting, but he reappeared just a couple of minutes after Louis left.

"Do you want to talk here or outside?" she said quietly. James had always hated it when she pulled him aside to discipline him in public.

He glanced at the people still scattered around the room. "Outside, I guess."

She stalked towards the portrait hole, pushed it open, and led the way around the first corner (because the Fat Lady was a notorious gossip). She turned to face him with arms crossed and brows raised expectantly.

"I'm not sorry."

Ginny gritted her teeth. Why, _why_ was he so set on antagonizing her?

"You're not sorry you made an obscene gesture in my direction?"

"No," he said defiantly, but Ginny could see the tiniest hint of an anxious little boy behind his eyes.

"But I suppose you would be sorry if I took your broomstick."

He shrugged. "If you like. You always do whatever you want, anyway."

Ginny looked up at him, at the wide stance, the rigid posture, the face turned away from her, and knew rowing with him now was pointless. She didn't know what to do, exactly, but she knew she wasn't going to get anywhere tonight.

"Go to bed."

"That's it?"

"What do you expect, James? You're too big to turn over my knee, it's too late to withhold pudding, and I yelled at you in front of the entire school less than a week ago, so I hardly think a private dressing down will have much effect. You've been rude and disrespectful despite my threat to take away your broomstick, so I really don't see how doing so would improve your attitude. Go to bed. I expect to see you there by the time I can check the map." Without waiting to see if he obeyed, she turned and walked away.

()()()()

Louis waited on the boys' stairs. "What the hell was that?"

James shrugged.

"I half expected you to show up without a hand," Louis said, eyeing both of James's. "Or giant bat bogeys all over your face, at the very least."

Ginny's favorite jinx was legendary. James made to go around, but his cousin stepped in front of him.

"If either of our dads hears about this, you are dead."

"Whatever."

"For Godric's sake, James, what the hell is wrong with you? I know she's been a right pain, but flipping off your mother? _Your_ mother?"

"Piss off," James said, pushing past.

Louis caught his arm. "Look, I know the meeting was rough. I'm sorry. I didn't think it was fair to make all the Gryffindors take extra patrols again or to require one of the other houses to do it."

"It's not fair to make Caitlin do it again when she was hurt worse than anybody." James jerked his arm free.

"Then stop being such an arse and earn some good will and get McGonagall to put you back on duty," Louis said in exasperation. "Aunt Ginny probably wants to go home almost as much as you want her to. Stop giving her a reason to be here."

"Just piss off, Louis. You're not the boss of me."

James slammed his dormitory door shut, yanked his robes over his head, abandoned them on the floor, and kicked off his trainers, ignoring the clatter when one of them rolled under Evan's bed. He continued stripping off, wanting nothing more than to go to sleep and forget the last three days ever happened.

"Oi!"

He turned to find his best mate pulling James's vest off his head. "Sorry," he muttered, wadding it into a ball and throwing it into his trunk, where it landed hard enough to make a muffled _thud _against his clean robes.

"Calm down, would you?"

James shook out his pajama shirt with a _snap._ "This is a disaster," he said, sticking his arms through the sleeves and pulling it over his head, forgetting he had planned to shower. "She is an absolute disaster, and I can't get away from her for even one second because I'm stuck in Gryffindor Tower, and she's in league with the Fat Lady!"

"You're just making it worse for yourself," Cameron said, picking up his and James's robes and putting them down the laundry chute.

"Worse?" James stopped, bent over with his pajama trousers half on. "How could this possibly be worse?"

"I don't think she would be going round calling you 'Jamie' and cutting your meat for you if you would just talk to her."

"You don't know my mother."

"Neither do you, apparently. The ruder you are, the clingier she gets. Seems to me the fastest way to get her out of here is to do what she wants."

James shoved his bed curtains back and climbed inside. "She wouldn't be happy no matter what I did."

Cameron sighed and sat down on the edge of his bed facing James. "Look, maybe you can talk to Al, see if he'll meet her for lunch or take her for a walk or something, give you a break. Surely she wants to see her other kids too."

"Don't count on it."

Cameron pushed off his bed to stand over James. "Why are you being such a git?"

James sat up. "What?"

"Your mum left her husband and her job to come up here and hang out with a bunch of teenage boys because she was worried about you, and you've been downright hateful."

"Well, how else should I be?"

"I don't know, maybe grateful? There aren't a lot of mums who would go to that much bother. I know mine wouldn't. She's too busy traveling the world and posing for photographs."

"My family's in the papers all the time!"

"No, your family is in the papers when they do something newsworthy, like sponsor controversial legislation or solve crimes or host a charity auction. You mother writes about Quidditch matches, she doesn't create scenes at clubs or send write-ups of her parties to the social editor. Your mum brings you to King's Cross and picks you up every term, James, not just at the beginning or end of the year, and most of the time your dad is there too! I could push somebody off the bloody Astronomy Tower and my mum wouldn't send a Howler, but yours is actually interested in you, and you're treating her like shit!"

James stared at his red-faced friend in shock. Louis was one thing, but Cameron had never yelled at him. He knew Cameron's mum was—well, _flighty_ was how Cameron usually described her—but James had never really thought about how many times Cameron had been alone on Platform Nine and Three-Quarters, or how little post he got, or how he never passed around pictures from Christmas or summer holidays.

"How do you get to King's Cross?"

"Knight Bus," Cameron said shortly. "It stops at the alley behind the station."

"I—I don't know what to say."

"Say you'll stop being such a jerk and be nice to your mother." Cameron busied himself laying out his robes for tomorrow.

"You sound like my dad."

"He must be a smart bloke." Cameron looked up with just a hint of a smile.

James returned it in full, eager to stay on good terms with Cameron, who had stuck by him all weekend.

"Is it safe to come in now?" Evan stuck his head around the dormitory door. Nate and Sam were behind him.

"Yeah, yeah. Cam was reading me the riot act, but he's done now."

"We heard," Nate said. "Your mum's not that bad. As mums go, I mean," he added hastily, catching James's incredulous expression.

"She's really nice," Sam said. Which, coming from Sam, was like an official announcement with horn and drums.

"To you, maybe," James grumbled.

"She likes Quidditch," Evan said. "And she understands it. How many mums do you know who can talk Quidditch like that?"

"You should see her play."

"Godric, can we? That would be brilliant."

James shrugged. "I'm sure she'll follow me to Quidditch practice if McGonagall ever lets us start up again."

"She knows more secret passages than we do," Cameron said. "That's cool. Come on, even you have to admit that's really cool."

Of course it was, but James merely shrugged.

"And she can cook! Those biscuits she sent last Christmas were amazing," Nate said.

"She was nice enough to send enough for all of us," Sam said.

"What is this, the Ginny Potter Admiration Society?"

"Not to mention she's—"

"Don't you dare say she's pretty," James warned.

"Actually, I was going to say she's—" Evan raised his voice to be heard over James's throat-clearing. "Hot."

"She's my mum! And she's _old_!"

"She can't be that old," Nate said reasonably.

"She's forty!"

There was silence in the dormitory as the boys processed this unwelcome news.

Evan was the first to rally. "Well, she doesn't look it. Thirty-three, thirty-five, tops."

There was an eager chorus of agreement.

"She's married!" James insisted. "To the wizard who defeated Voldemort. Do any of you really want to tick _him_ off?" He ignored the inadvertent reminder that he had just done something guaranteed to anger his dad and pressed his point. "_And_ he's an Auror, and so is my uncle Ron. She has five older brothers! Who wants to mess with that?"

"Your dad did," Evan said, and the rest of the boys snickered.

"Yeah, well, he's Harry Potter."

"I thought it was six," Sam said.

"What?"

"Her _Who's Who in Quidditch_ biography says she grew up with six brothers."

"She did. Uncle Fred died in the war. Here at Hogwarts, actually."

"Shit," Nate said, looking stricken. "I talked about him, about my dad going to school with him and George."

"It must be hard for her to be here," Cameron said quietly.

James stared back at him. "Yeah," he said slowly, thinking of this for the first time. "Yeah, maybe so."


	7. Chapter 7

_Monday morning_

_the Great Hall_

The sixth-year boys went down to breakfast as a pack on Monday morning. Ginny was waiting in the common room again, and even though they lost her on the fifth floor, she was already at the Gryffindor table when they arrived. With a jerk of his head, James indicated for everyone to sit down near her, walked around to the opposite side of the table, and still managed to put Nate and Cameron between them.

"I've been thinking," he said to Cameron in an undertone. "How can we get Al to take Mum for a few hours? I don't have anything to bribe him with since McGonagall took the Cloak and the map."

Cameron tipped a platter and slid several kippers onto his plate. "Does your mum know about Maggie McLaggen?"

James's face lit up. "Brilliant! Stick, not carrot. Do you see him?"

"'Bout a third of the way from the end, right next to the lady in question."

Feeling much more cheerful in the knowledge that his brother could not leave without passing him, James loaded his own plate. He spotted Galahad as the owls flew in and automatically cleared a space for him, but the tawny owl flew past him and landed on Ginny's shoulder.

"It's from Harry!"

James's heart skipped a beat before he remembered there hadn't been time for an owl to fly home and back since he'd flipped her off last night. Harry must have written just because. James groaned. This was sure to be embarrassing. Ginny tore open the envelope and began to read, her breakfast all but forgotten.

"She reminds me of the seventh-year girls whose boyfriends have already left Hogwarts," Cameron said.

James spared his mother a brief glance, but so far she wasn't doing anything worse than twirling her hair around one finger and smiling goofily at the parchment.

"I think it's sweet." Holly Jordan sat down beside James, flashing a shapely ankle and calf as she raised her robes to climb over the bench. "Your parents are really cute together, James."

"They're parents. It's not possible for them to be cute." James discreetly pushed his elbow into Cameron's ribs; he was leaning far too close in his efforts to check out Holly.

"Well, I hope my husband still sends me love letters when I've been married as long as they have."

"Who's sending love letters?" Al and Maggie stopped behind James, although they weren't holding hands like usual.

"Mum and Dad."

"Sorry I asked."

"Listen, I need you to do me a favor."

"No."

James grabbed his brother's arm as he made to leave.

"Mum is all over you. I'm not doing any _favors_ until she goes home."

"Yeah, well, that's kind of the point. I need you to spend a couple of hours with her today, give me a break."

Al looked at Maggie, then back at his brother. "We have plans. Maggie has to revise for Divination, then we're—"

"Plans I promise not to tell Mum about, if you just meet her for lunch or a walk around the lake or something. One hour, Al, come on. I've had her for three whole days!"

"Ask Lily."

"I don't know Lily's secrets."

"It's all right, Al," Maggie said softly. "I can finish my dream diary while you're with your mum, and then we'll go down to the lake."

"Fine. I'll ask her now. Happy?"

"Very," James said, piling more eggs onto his plate.

()()()()

_Monday morning break_

_the Charms corridor_

"Can't you do something to make yourself less conspicuous?" James said as he and Ginny queued up outside the Charms classroom.

"Like what?" Their progress through the castle had been painstaking; everyone wanted to slow down or turn around and stare whenever they spotted her.

"I dunno. Maybe Lily has some school robes you could borrow?"

Ginny glanced down. Her robes weren't flashy, but the colors did stand out amongst the uniform black.

"I have a couple of black ones I could wear instead."

He grunted, which she took as a sign of approval. He still hadn't apologized, not for the obscene gesture nor his hurtful words. She had lain awake most of the night staring at James's dot in the boys' dormitory and thinking about what to do next, but the only decision she had made was that she wasn't going home. Go home now and James won, as clearly as if she waved a white flag of surrender in the middle of the Great Hall.

Harry's letter this morning had made her miss him even more. He was as stumped about James as she was, but the hardest thing about being here was the isolation, the sense that she didn't belong, and she missed Harry's support. Oh, he had asked about James and how it was going, but … well, she wasn't ready to admit just how bad it was. James constantly trying to lose her; Al avoiding her in the common room; the way Louis had introduced her in the prefect meeting not as his aunt, but as James's mother. Rose leaving the prefect meeting without speaking to her. Lily arranging to meet only when she thought she wouldn't be seen.

Professor Viridian opened the door, and Ginny followed James into the classroom, fingering Harry's letter in her pocket.

()()()()

"Potter, what are you reading?" Professor Viridian stopped his lecture on the _Aguamenti_ charm.

James looked up from his scroll of notes to protest he wasn't reading anything when Ginny spoke.

"It's a letter from my husband, Professor."

And so it was; James recognized his dad's scrawl. He stared from his mother to his professor, half amused, half apprehensive. _Please, please don't make her read it out loud._

"And you have nothing better to do in my class than read personal correspondence?"

"Well … I have heard it all before, Professor."

James slid a little farther away from her, surprised at her audacity. But then again, Ginny hadn't spent six years under Viridian's iron thumb.

"Very well, then, perhaps you would like to demonstrate."

Ginny rose from her seat and walked towards the front of the classroom. "_Aguamenti_," she said clearly, sending a stream of water from the tip of her wand into the bin in a neat arc.

"This is a N.E.W.T. class, Mrs. Potter," Viridian said with a sneer. "Nonverbal spells only."

She gave the professor a disdainful look, then returned her attention to the bin. She set it on fire, extinguished it, vanished the rubble, and conjured a new one, all without saying a word. James and Cameron grinned at each other as Ginny caught the shiny new bin in midair and set it on the desk. Its metallic ring echoed through the silent classroom.

"Is there anything else you would like me to demonstrate, Professor?" She sounded polite, but James heard the ice behind her tone.

"What were your N.E.W.T. scores, young lady?"

James's smile slid off his face. If she told that, then everyone would expect him….

"I earned an outstanding in Charms."

He breathed a little easier. At least she hadn't listed all of them.

Viridian raised his eyebrows. "At N.E.W.T.-level?"

"At O.W.L. and N.E.W.T. It was my best subject."

"I thought that was Quidditch," Viridian said snidely.

"Hogwarts didn't offer a N.E.W.T. in Quidditch when I was a pupil."

James sniggered, and so did several of his classmates.

Viridian glared round at all of them. "In the future, if you are going to sit in on my lessons, you will pay attention. Even if you have _heard it all before_."

"Of course, Professor."

Ginny resumed her seat beside James and tucked the letter in her bag.

"You should have used your Bat-Bogey Hex," James whispered.

"Watch out, or I'll use it on you." But she smiled.

()()()()

_Monday afternoon_

_the guest suites_

James and Cameron stood outside Ginny's room, waiting for her to change before heading outside to Herbology.

"Well? How do I look?" She spread both hands wide and turned in a circle.

She was wearing plain black robes with a red and gold rosette where the house patch should be and had pulled her long hair, usually worn loose, into a single plait halfway down her back.

"You look like Lily."

"That's good, right?"

James wasn't sure. She would be less conspicuous like this, less likely to draw attention from across the halls or the courtyard, but she looked young, not like someone's mum.

"I dunno, mate, I think a lot more posters will go up today," Cameron muttered.

"What posters?" Ginny fell into step beside them.

James said nothing, but she had learned Cameron had no immunity to her questioning look and sent it in his direction.

"There are a lot more Harpies posters on the dormitory walls than there were last week," Cameron said.

"As there should be," Ginny said promptly. "They've put together an excellent team this year."

"No, Mum. Your Harpies posters."

"Really?" She sounded pleased.

James sent her a dark look, and her expression sobered. Briefly.

"Which posters?"

"Your 2004 Player of the Season seems to be the most popular," Cameron said.

James didn't even know Cameron knew which posters were which. James hadn't—at least not before this summer.

"Well, it certainly sold the most copies. I had just announced my retirement when it came out."

"Do we have to talk about this?" James said as they crossed the Entrance Hall.

"Al is going to meet me after Herbology, so I'll see you at dinner," Ginny said.

"Okay," James said, resisting the urge to cheer just to rub her nose in it. She had been a little less obnoxious today. Still sticking to him like a bowtruckle on fairy eggs, but not quite so mouthy—Charms notwithstanding. Still, he was more than happy to turn her over to Al for an hour. Maybe James could even get some distance from her during Herbolog, if she visited with Longbottom.

She had circles under her eyes and seemed tired, like she hadn't slept well. As if James really had hurt her feelings yesterday. Which was what he had been trying to do, hurt her badly enough that she would go home and let him alone, but the idea he might have succeeded didn't make him feel victorious at all. More like … ashamed and guilty. Especially when he thought about what Cameron had said last night, that it must be hard for her to come back to the place where she had lost friends and a brother. James knew he needed to apologize, especially for what he had said outside the DADA classroom, but he was still angry.

He adjusted his rucksack on his shoulder as they passed the vegetable gardens. Ginny and Cameron were talking about the Harpies. James had taken the easy way out yesterday when she asked him what the problem was. It was about more than her being here. More even than the owls crossing and pranking McGonagall before he got the Howler. And he felt more than a little trepidation about his dad finding out about his attitude this weekend. Harry didn't care much about detentions as long as James's marks were good, but he did care about Ginny, and he would not be pleased to hear how James had been treating her.

James entered the greenhouse behind Cameron, who had opened the door for Ginny, and dropped his bag by their table. He needed to find a way to apologize, and he needed to do it before Ginny wrote back to Harry.

Because the last thing James needed was _both_ of his famous parents following him around.

* * *

a/n: So, I'm a little early tonight :) It feels to me like this story is dragging a bit, so you might see some random extra updates now and again. Also, for my regular readers (love and ice cream to you!), I'm working on the 8th year fic for NaNo. Again. New excerpts are up on the Camp NaNo webpage (linked on my profile), and I will add more as the month goes on. Thanks for reading!


	8. Chapter 8

__A/N: Thanks to those of you who commented in your reviews you didn't feel the story was dragging :) Here's your extra update anyway. I realized earlier this week that James's apology here is actually three chapters on from his hateful words outside the DADA classroom (chapter 5), yet it's barely 24 hours in the story. It's that kind of thing that makes me anxious about it dragging for those of you who are following along week by week. So, continue to watch the time and location tags at the beginning of the scenes as sometimes we'll have a lot of detail and know most of what happens in a day, and sometimes we'll skip over days completely. I'm guessing we're about halfway through (or maybe not quite that far).

* * *

_Monday afternoon_

_the greenhouses_

Al was waiting outside the greenhouse when Ginny and the sixth years left Herbology.

"I heard you got into trouble with Viridian."

"Hello to you too."

He led her behind the greenhouses, away from the other pupils. "Did you really show him up in front of the whole class?"

"Can we talk about something else?" They continued past the vegetable patch and along the edge of the Forbidden Forest. Clearly, Al was no more eager to be seen with her than Lily had been.

"James said he thought you were going to Bat-Bogey him."

"Your brother exaggerates." Although she had been tempted. The kids always complained about Viridian, and now she knew they were right. He was an arrogant git.

Al laughed. "You're lucky he didn't take points. It's his favorite thing to do other than hear himself talk. I heard you were reading Dad's letter. Did you ever lose points with him?"

"You mean for sneaking out with him? Of course not. We had the map and the Cloak. Speaking of which, since both of those are now in my possession, how did James persuade you to take me off his hands for an hour?"

"He didn't. I just thought, you know, it would be nice to visit."

"Did he pay you?"

"Mu-um."

"Wait—he's got something on you, doesn't he?" Ginny stopped walking and put her hands on her hips. "What have you done that I don't know about?"

"Nothing bad," Al said quickly.

"It's a girl."

"No." But he wouldn't meet her eyes and resumed walking.

She dropped her arms and followed. "What's her name?"

"You said you weren't here for me and Lily, that you would let us alone."

She sighed. "I did." More's the pity. "All right then. Lily told me about the scrimmage Quidditch match. I'm sorry you didn't make the team."

He shrugged. "I made a lot of assists and helped get two Gryffindors on the team. It's what I'm good at."

"You're good at scoring too." Maybe even better than James. No one really knew because it seemed Al always held back, never competing head on with his brother.

"I've been wanting to ask you about James. Do you know why he's upset?"

Al didn't answer right away. Ginny waited as they gave the Whomping Willow a wide berth.

"People always say I look like Dad, but James is the one they expect to _be_ Dad. Lily—she got Sorted into Slytherin and has made her own way ever since, but James can't escape it."

"But that's always been true, Al. What's different this year?"

"I think he got tired of trying," he said simply. "Decided he'd just blow everyone off, only—"

"Your dad got into his share of trouble at Hogwarts too."

"Yeah."

"Do you know why he's pissed at me?"

"Other than you coming up here and ruining his life?"

"Yes, before that," Ginny said irritably. They had looped around behind Hagrid's cabin and were walking up the drive. She couldn't help giving the Quidditch pitch a longing look.

"You should ask James."

"I did. I don't think he told me the truth."

"I don't know, exactly."

"But you have an idea."

Al led them towards the Quidditch stands. "James is a really good Chaser, but no one seems able to give him a compliment without comparing him to you. After we won the Cup last year, some of the other players were even muttering how it was unfair, that he trained with a professional."

"Is that why he stopped letting me play with him this summer?" She and James had flown together, played in family matches at home and at the Burrow, but he had refused her help with Chaser drills.

Al nodded. "He wanted to be able to say it was his talent, his work."

Ginny sighed. She hated to see her son struggling and not be able to help him.

"Don't tell him I said any of this, okay?"

"Of course I won't. But he's going to know."

Al shrugged. "No offense, Mum, but … I reckon the more you know, the faster you'll go home."

Ginny did her best to keep the blow to her heart from showing on her face. "Enough about your brother. What's new with you?"

Al veered away from Ginny as soon as they entered the Great Hall for dinner, but James caught her eye and gave her a little wave. Minuscule, really, but Ginny was eager for any friendly sign. He was sitting on the side that faced the Slytherin table, like she had every meal since lunch on Friday, and he even moved over to make room for her.

"Mrs. Potter, you were amazing in Charms today," Holly Jordan said.

"Yeah, amazing," Cameron said, but he was looking at Holly, not Ginny. James didn't seem to notice.

"You will be able to do all that by the end of the year," Ginny said, suspecting Neville was mistaken about who exactly wanted to impress Holly Jordan.

"Still, you put Viridian in his place," James said. Her little demonstration seemed to have broken the ice between them.

"Something that you, as his pupil, are not eligible to do," Ginny said firmly.

"Don't worry. You haven't given us any ideas we didn't have already," Evan said, reaching for another chop.

Ginny let the conversation flow around her, answering questions about her Charms N.E.W.T. and eating an extra slice of treacle tart for Harry. As the sixth-years climbed the marble staircase back towards the Gryffindor common room, James tugged on Ginny's robes.

"Where are we going?"

"You'll see," James said, continuing to lead her away from the flow of pupils.

They turned and climbed, passing classrooms and offices, suites of armor and landscape paintings, and as she thought about it, things started to look familiar.

"The East Wing?" Ginny said. "There's nothing in the East Wing except—" She stopped.

"Mum?" James turned to look at her.

"The Portable Swamp is this way," Ginny said.

"Yeah. I thought—well, you haven't been to Hogwarts since you left, so I thought you might like to see it. For—for Uncle Fred." He rubbed the back of his head. "It's sort of a … well, you'll see."

Rather than being roped off as it had been immediately after its creation, the swamp was bordered by a low decorative stone wall and fed by a small stream of water from an open dragon's mouth. Above the swamp, on a large golden plaque resembling a galleon, were the words:

_Portable Swamp Created by Fred and George Weasley_

_Gryffindor House 1989-1996_

_This swamp remains in memory of the members of Dumbledore's Army, who fought against the Ministry of Magic's interference with Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry during the Second Wizarding War and defended the school during the Battle of Hogwarts on 2 May 1998._

Below this inscription was a list of all the members of Dumbledore's Army: one star for founding members, two stars for those who died in the Battle, and three stars for founding members who died.

"It's a memorial," Ginny whispered, staring at the three stars beside Fred's name. "I—how long has this been here?"

"Teddy said the last Charms teacher did it and cast the spells to create the fountain and make it permanent."

There was a war memorial at the Ministry, but this was different. This was theirs, a reminder to those who walked the same halls and slept in the same beds that kids had once gathered together and fought for what they believed was right, for their home.

"Did you know them?"

Ginny's eyes drifted over the list of names. "Every one. Many of them quite well. Parvati and Lavender and I were pretty close that last year, and Colin … Colin was in my year. We were friends from our very first Welcome Feast. He—he was my Potions partner." She turned to James. "Thank you for bringing me here."

"I'm sorry I didn't think of it before."

She reached for his hand and squeezed it.

"I'm sorry about yesterday too," he blurted.

Ginny froze. James continued holding her hand.

"Sometimes—sometimes I wish you weren't famous, that you were just my mum. That's all I meant. Just my mum, not Ginny Weasley Potter."

"I—" Ginny swallowed and tried again. "I wish that too, love." He was staring down at the swamp, and she reached out to brush his hair out of his eyes. "I know it's hard for you sometimes. I would change it if I could."

"I know." He dropped her hand. "Almost my entire family is on that wall," he said.

Ginny looked at the giant galleon again. Fred, George, Angelina, Ron, Hermione, she, and Harry were all listed as founding members. Of James's parents, aunts, and uncles, only five were missing, and three of them had been members of the Order of the Phoenix.

"It must seem like a lot to live up to."

He shrugged one shoulder.

"They're just people, James. Look. Michael Corner was my boyfriend at the time, and your dad had a crush on Cho Chang. Lee Jordan, Holly's dad, was Quidditch commentator. Zacharias Smith was a stuck-up prat. I don't know how Harry put up with him. Ernie MacMillan and Hannah Abbott—that's Neville's Hannah—had the best Chocolate Frog collection in the school. There's Madame Branstone-she joined the last year, when I managed to convince Neville we should let in third-years and up, just like Harry had. Seamus Finnegan—" Ginny laughed. "Seamus was really good at blowing things up, most of the time unintentionally."

James gave her a small smile.

"We weren't trying to be heroes. Remember what I said last night? We just wanted to pass our exams."

"It turned into a lot more than that, though."

Ginny stared at the stars again. "Yes. Yes, it did."

()()()()

_Wednesday afternoon_

_greenhouse four_

"You seem to be having a better day," Neville said, joining Ginny at the Fanged Geranium she was pruning. She had proven so proficient at retrieving Snargaluff pods that he had banned her from helping James and Cameron and set her to work at the back of the greenhouse instead.

"James isn't trying to escape me after every lesson or ignoring my existence, so yeah. Much better." Ginny smiled.

"And you're not standing on tables in the Great Hall or reminding him to wash behind his ears."

"You heard about that?" she said sheepishly.

"I'm Head of Gryffindor House. I know everything that happens in the common room."

Ginny wasn't fooled. "Al blabbed, didn't he?"

"I think 'tattled' is more accurate. He was pretty disappointed you didn't hex James's fingers together."

"Louis wouldn't let me at him." Ginny added more dragon dung to the base of the plant, jerking her hand back when it snapped at her.

"I have more good news for you. McGonagall has lifted James's Quidditch ban."

"Really? Oh, that's wonderful! You have no idea how hard it's been to be back at Hogwarts and not be able to fly."

"I also heard you talked some about the war." He turned and leaned his back against the table so he could keep an eye on the class.

"Uh-huh." She filled a nearby watering can with a spell.

"That's not what I meant, Ginny."

"What?"

Neville placed his hand on the spout of the can, redirecting it. "Water the roots, not the leaves."

"Sorry. I wasn't paying attention."

"I meant for you to tell James about your experiences, not the whole of Gryffindor House."

She set down the watering can.

"You were the heart and soul of the resistance that year. You were Harry Potter's girlfriend before, during, and after."

"But Harry—"

Neville stopped her with a look. "James deserves the inside track, to know more than what's in the history books, to know _before_ his friends. It's like he has all the drawbacks of being related to you and Harry without any of the benefits. Yes, I know that's an exaggeration," he said, cutting her off when she opened her mouth. "But it's how he feels."

Ginny's shoulders sagged. "I didn't think it would be this hard."

"Coming to Hogwarts?"

"Motherhood. I thought it would get easier over the years because I'd have more experience, you know?"

Neville laughed. "You're a wonderful mother, but in many ways you're still treating James like a child and he's not. Think about what we were doing at sixteen."

"That's just it," she said, ducking as a snargaluff pod whizzed between them, followed by an apologetic Millie. "It's absolutely terrifying. I don't know how Mum stood it."

"So say so. Everyone else's account always gets overblown. Tell him the truth—the reality of what it was like."

Ginny busied herself picking up the debris on the pruning table. "I don't want to scare him."

"That's the mother in you, thinking about her little boy," Neville said gently. "Two years, Ginny—you know how fast two years goes by! In less than two years, James is going to be out on his own. He'll have a job, a flat, maybe a girlfriend … he's not your little boy anymore. Neither is Al," he added.

"I know." She sighed, dusting her hands into the bin.

"Do you?"

She looked over at her son, looking ridiculous in goggles and a mouth guard, holding the snargaluff tentacles out of the way so Cameron could retrieve another pod, and nodded.

"I haven't—the boys have been impressed by how well I know the secret passages and staircases, but I haven't told them why."

"Or why you always sit facing the Slytherin table."

"Their sister is a Slytherin."

"Shit," Neville said, wincing. "I forgot about that."

"Harry and I have always tried not to pass on our own prejudices, but ever since Lily was Sorted, we've been extra-careful what we say about Slytherin House."

"Well, there's no hiding what Slytherin was. You'll just have to emphasize that's not what Slytherin is."

"It's not?"

"I won't pretend they're the best-liked house, but it has the feel of normal schoolyard rivalry, not—"

"Torture, death, and mayhem?"

"Exactly." Neville smiled at her, then clapped his hands, walking up the aisle. "All right, class, clear up please! James, I need a word."

()()()()

_Wednesday evening_

Ginny waited outside the Fat Lady's portrait, having gone to her room after lessons to change into trousers and trainers. Since James had toned down the attitude a bit, she was experimenting with giving him a bit of space.

The entire Gryffindor Quidditch team emerged en mass, chattering loudly. Obsessed with James and making arrangements for work, Ginny hadn't thought to bring her own broomstick with her, but she was so excited to fly at Hogwarts, she didn't care if she had to use a school broom.

Five minutes into practice, Ginny was regretting this oversight immensely. She had been flying on international-standard racing brooms since her seventeenth birthday, when Harry and Ron bought her a Nimbus 4000, and she was spoiled. Determined not to interrupt James's practice, she climbed above the stands—at what seemed a snail's pace—and swung out over the grounds. Hogwarts looked so beautiful and peaceful from up here.

But there was Dumbledore's tomb, glowing white in the late-afternoon shadows, and she could make out the outline of the Shrieking Shack, where both Lupin and Snape had suffered. She had been sitting on this end of the stands when Harry appeared out of the maze with Cedric's body, and the Forbidden Forest still hid terrors best left in the past.

Ginny missed flying; she missed watching the teams practice and visiting with the players; she missed the energy and buzz of the newsroom just before deadline, the cushy chair in her office, the view out her kitchen window, her en suite bathroom; and Godric, how she missed Harry. They had written three times—her to him, him to her, and her to him again—but it wasn't enough. She wanted to see him; see his face light up when she entered the room, see his messy hair in the morning, see his smile. She missed tea in the mornings when they were both too sleepy to talk and seeing his towel hung up beside hers and the scratch of his stubble when they kissed hello in the evenings. She missed flirting with him to get the Quidditch section first and yelling at him to stop drinking from the milk carton and the way he always played with her hair whenever they were close.

She missed Harry enough that she was tempted to go home tonight, walk down to the gates after curfew and Apparate back before breakfast. They had been separated before, of course. Many times after the war, starting with her seventh year here at Hogwarts, but never by choice, and this felt a lot like choosing to be away from Harry. Ginny turned the broom in a wide arc, its radius unable to handle the sharp turns she was used to, and flew over the Black Lake back towards the pitch.

James needed her; she was still convinced of that. He had stopped being so hateful, but she didn't see anything to indicate he'd had a sincere change of heart. She needed to get him to open up to her, and maybe Neville was right.

Maybe she needed to open up first.


	9. Chapter 9

A/N: You guys are the best :D Thanks for your kind words and reassurances that the story isn't dragging; I promise to have faith in you next time I get a little artistic insecurity. I really debated about what to have Ginny share with James but ultimately decided on the Chamber. Most of these stories would have simply been told to the Next Gen, and with Ginny actually at Hogwarts, I wanted her to have something to show. I'm not opposed to doing another "show and tell," so suggestions are welcome. I also couldn't resist having James already know that Tom Riddle was Voldemort; if Harry had known this one tiny piece of information...

* * *

_Thursday morning break_

_the second floor_

"You go on," Ginny said to the rest of the sixth years leaving Transfiguration. "We'll see you at lunch." She waited for a gap in the flux of pupils, then led James down the hall and into the last corridor. She checked to make sure they were alone, then stopped at a bathroom with an old "out of order" sign dangling by one corner. Looking left and right again, she pushed open the door and waved James inside.

"Mum, that's a girls' loo!"

"No one's in here. Come on." But he didn't move, so Ginny grabbed his sleeve. "Come _on_, quick."

"What are we doing in here?"

"Hello? Myrtle?" She breathed a sign of relief when there was no answering wail. Even the floor was dry. "Good, she's not here."

"You're acting really weird. What's going on?"

Ginny took a deep breath and looked him straight in the eye. "This is the entrance to the Chamber of Secrets."

James's mouth fell open.

She pointed at the sinks but did not approach them. "Look closely and tell me what you see."

Sending her one more strange look, he did as instructed.

"This one! There's a snake etched into the side of the faucet."

She nodded. "That's it. This bathroom belongs, so to speak, to Moaning Myrtle."

"The ghost who likes to haunt bathrooms? She visited Dad in the bath once."

"She did? When?"

"During the Tri-Wizard Tournament, when he was working on the egg clue. The other Hogwarts champion—"

"Cedric Diggory," Ginny said quietly.

"Yeah, Cedric, he told Dad to take the egg into the bath and gave him the password for the prefects' bathroom. Dad told me last year, when I made prefect. Just to, you know, watch out for her. Why, you're not jealous, are you?" He grinned at her.

"Of course not," Ginny said, smoothing out her expression. "I've actually— Never mind. Anyway, Moaning Myrtle haunts this bathroom especially because this is where she died. She was killed by the basilisk when Tom Riddle opened the Chamber the first time, in the 1940s."

"And he tricked you into opening it through the diary."

Ginny nodded, crossing her arms over her chest. "It was … the diary was a Horcrux. It's why we have drilled into all of you to never, ever, ever trust anything-"

"That can think for itself if you can't see where it keeps its brain," James said in a weary, sing-song tone. "And to always bring anything clever to you or Dad. I _know_. What's a Horcrux?"

"It is the darkest of dark magic, an object that shelters part of one's soul."

James frowned. "Part of your soul?"

"It requires an act of murder to split the soul, then the piece that's broken off can be protected by the object, tethering the wizard to life even if his body is killed."

"That's how Voldemort survived when he murdered Dad's parents? He had a Horcrux?"

Horcruxes, actually, but that was a conversation for Harry. "Yes."

"So what does that mean, that the diary was a Horcrux? I mean, what did that mean for you?"

"Because I opened up and shared so much of myself with Tom, it made me vulnerable, and our connection made him stronger. He was able to possess me, for longer and longer periods each time, until he finally came out of the diary and forced me to not only open the Chamber, but to actually enter it with him."

James looked from the sink back to her. "You were … possessed by Voldemort?"

There it was, the fear and revulsion she hadn't wanted to see.

She rubbed her arms, suddenly cold. "It was horrible. I've never been so glad to see anyone in my life as I was Harry when I woke up in the Chamber of Secrets."

"Let's get out of here," James said abruptly, taking her arm and leading her out of the bathroom and away from that corridor.

()()()()

"Here." James pushed open the door to an empty classroom near the marble staircase. "Sit down. Do you want some tea? I could go down to the kitchens." She looked awfully peaky.

"I'm fine. I just don't like going in there."

"You didn't have to do that," he said quietly, feeling a little ashamed that she had done so when he'd been so rotten to her. "You could have just told me."

Ginny shook her head. "It is important to face the truth, even when it's ugly."

He shifted, trying to think of something else to say. "So, that bathroom's been out of order since you were here?"

"So much so that Hermione brewed Polyjuice Potion in one of the stalls."

"Aunt Hermione?" Brewing potions outside of lessons was strictly forbidden (not to mention that Polyjuice Potion was a controlled substance), and his godmother was a stickler for rules. James had always thought she should have married Uncle Percy instead of Uncle Ron.

"That same year. They thought Draco Malfoy was the Heir of Slytherin and came up with the idea of taking Polyjuice Potion to get into the Slytherin common room and question him."

"Scorpius's dad?"

"He's the one."

"Wait, that same year? Aunt Hermione brewed Polyjuice as a second-year?" He knew his aunt was smart, but … that was N.E.W.T.-standard, that was!

"Indeed she did. Perfectly, of course. Only…."

"Only what?"

Ginny's lips were twitching. "She thought she had a hair from one of the Slytherin girls, but it turned out … it was her cat."

"Don't tell me…."

"She had pointy cat's ears just barely sticking out of her hair, and whiskers, and—" Ginny joined in James's laughter—"a tail! She was in the hospital wing for a month."

"I can't believe no one has ever told me that! Do Rose and Hugo know?"

"I don't know. Maybe."

"Can I tell them?" Most of the stories that had anything to do with Voldemort he was forbidden to share with his cousins. He didn't think his parents and his godparents agreed on what they, the kids, should know.

"You may tell them she drank Polyjuice with a cat hair, but not about the Chamber or the bathroom, and definitely not about Horcruxes."

"Why did you tell me?"

Ginny pulled her braid over her shoulder and began fiddling with the ends. "I thought you deserved to know. Neville said something about you having all the bad of being related to me and your dad without any of the advantages." She shrugged. "He also reminded me that you'll be out of the house in less than two years, and being here has reminded me how old sixteen is."

"Did you really go to the Yule Ball together?"

Ginny smiled. "Yes, we did."

"Why? You fancied Dad."

"Your dad didn't ask me. Neville did."

"That's it?"

"I was a third-year. The ball was for fourth-years and above, so unless one of the older boys asked me, I wasn't going to be able to go. And I liked Neville. He was sweet."

"So, you would have gone with any bloke who asked?" James said skeptically.

"Not literally anyone, but yes. It's not as hard to get a date as most boys think."

James considered this for a minute before changing the subject again. "Where did you go last night at Quidditch practice?"

"I went flying. I thought—"

"You've been following me everywhere for days, and you couldn't stick around when I actually wanted you to?"

"I didn't know you wanted me to. I thought—I didn't want to be a distraction."

He rolled his eyes. "At Quidditch practice? It's the once place in this castle you actually belong!"

She pushed her braid back and stood up. "I'm sorry! I know you haven't been Captain very long, and—"

"There were a bunch of people waiting to watch you fly! I wanted to introduce my team to my mother, the famous Quidditch star. Maybe she could give us a few pointers, help us look good at the Slytherin practice tomorrow, but no. She's off doing her own thing and couldn't be arsed."

"Oi, watch your mouth!"

James crossed his arms and looked away from her. That had really hurt, when he had turned around and she was gone. Like he was nothing, like she didn't care to see him play.

She was standing right in front of him now, but he refused to look at her.

"I'm sorry, Jami—James. I'd have been delighted to help you. I wish you had told me."

"I wish you just knew," he muttered.

"How am I supposed to know anything? You won't talk to me!"

"But you're my mum." He faced her. "You're supposed to know what's good for me and what I want."

"No, James, I supposed to _do_ what's best for you. And I thought I was."

"Are you going to be here tomorrow?"

"I was thinking of hitting a couple of practices and spending some time with your dad."

James shifted. "Would you come to the double practice tomorrow? It's for a scrimmage match, us and Slytherin against the 'Puffs and 'Claws."

She beamed at him. "Of course. Lily said it was your idea. I think it's brilliant."

"You do?"

"I do. Took me by surprise to think of playing with Slytherin, but it's a great way to build interest in the season."

"Yeah, well, we weren't thrilled about it either, but I drew the short straw."

The bell rang, signaling the end of his free period.

"Tell me about the Slytherin beater," Ginny said as they joined the pupils spilling into the halls. "Is he any good?"

()()()()

_Thursday afternoon_

_the Arithmancy corridor_

Ginny turned around at the sounds of a scuffle and breaking glass.

A young Hufflepuff sat on the floor outside the girls' loo surrounded by books and scrolls of parchment. From the looks of things, the older girl in front of her had knocked her clean off her feet. Ginny crossed the hall to help as the girls collected their belongings.

"Here, I can fix that for you," she said, pointing her wand at the broken flask that had spilled out of the Hufflepuff's schoolbag. "_Reparo_. _Tergeo._" She smiled kindly at the girl and handed it to her. "No replacing the potion, though. Sorry."

"Potter!"

Even more than twenty years later, the displeasure in the crisp voice was instantly recognizable.

"I didn't do anything!" came James's voice from ten feet away.

"_Mrs._ Potter," Professor McGonagall said, coming to stand in front of Ginny. Every eye in the hall, including the two girls who had collided, the sixth-year Arithmancy class, and several stragglers, fixed on the Headmistress, but her eyes focused on the wand in Ginny's hand.

Ginny whipped it behind her back.

"What is the first rule of Hogwarts?"

Ginny swallowed, feeling as thoroughly chastised as she had in her first year when she had successfully transfigured her match into a needle and stabbed Colin Creevey in her excitement.

"No magic in the corridors, Professor."

"Mmm." McGonagall was pressing her lips together, but Ginny thought she saw one corner of her mouth twitch. "Are you a teacher?"

"No."

"Are you otherwise exempted from the rule in a way of which I am unaware?"

"No, Professor." Ginny could see James out of the corner of her eye. He looked delighted.

"Mr. Potter, perhaps you can remind your mother of the penalty for such an infraction?"

"A non-malicious use of magic in the corridors is a deduction of five house points. But…." He paused, then continued when McGonagall remained silent. "It's been a really, _really_ long time since Mum was a pupil here, Professor."

There was no mistaking it this time: McGonagall's lips definitely twitched.

"Very well. Three points from Gryffindor. Off you go, everyone. Lessons are about to start."

"I'm sorry," Ginny said as she returned to her place in the queue. She certainly hadn't meant to cause trouble for James by losing house points, but most of the Gryffindors in line looked amused, not angry. "I forgot about that rule. And that bit about it being a long time was completely unnecessary."

"It worked, didn't it? We lost half as many points as we would have otherwise."

The girl in front of James turned round, and Ginny noticed she was wearing both a Ravenclaw patch and a prefect badge. "I heard you had Quidditch practice last night."

James looked surprised. "Yeah, so?"

"If you can play Quidditch, you can resume prefect duties. I was supposed to have an extra patrol tonight, but you can have it back. Meet Charlotte in the Entrance Hall at nine o'clock."

"Great," James muttered.

()()()()

_Thursday evening_

_the Entrance Hall_

James, Ginny, and several of the older Gryffindors were crossing the crowded Entrance Hall after dinner when they passed a group of Slytherins lounging near the entrance to the dungeons.

"Oi, Potter, is your mummy going to be at practice tomorrow? Maybe she can make sure you don't fly too high and fall off your broom."

James kept walking. Cameron and Evan sent a couple of dirty looks in the Slytherins' direction.

"Yeah, Jimmy, I heard she's been cutting your meat for you. Does she take you to the potty too?"

"It's Jamie," Ginny snapped. "I thought Slytherins were supposed to be cunning, but you lot look like you just crawled out from under a rock. Why don't you use some of that resourcefulness and find something better to do than revealing your reptilian stupidity in front of half the school?"

That brought the hall to a halt, even the two boys and their companions.

"What?" Ginny said, noticing all the Gryffindors staring at her. "What?"

"Mum, you can't talk to them like that," James said in a low voice.

"They're Slytherins," she said indignantly. "And they were making fun—"

"I know, but you can't insult them," CeCe said.

"Why ever not? They insulted James, didn't they?"

"Yes, but they were just being obnoxious," Caitlin said.

"Of course they were obnoxious," Ginny said impatiently. "They're snakes!"

"That's just it, Aunt Ginny," Louis said. "House-related insults are double points."

Ginny's face turned red in one instant flush, and she pointed in the direction of the dungeons. "You mean to tell me ... after—after detentions and—_Cru_—" She broke off, then pushed through the cluster of Gryffindors and practically ran out the front doors.

James turned to Al, but he looked equally mystified. The boys followed their mother.

"Did she just say _Crucio_?" Louis asked, keeping pace.

"I don't know."


	10. Chapter 10

A/N: I'm adding a **warning** here for implied sexual assault and rape. On a happier note: I owe credit to the one, the only **My Dear Professor McGonagall** and her spectacular story** "A Call to Arms"** for some of the details of this chapter, like the idea of Ginny drawing a phoenix on the wall (which happens outside Snape's office in ACtA and I changed to the Slytherin common room for reasons I no longer remember) and Ginny inventing the slogan "Dumbledore's Army, Still Recruiting!" In fact, you will see me referring to "A Call to Arms" _a lot_ in the upcoming months, so if you haven't read it yet, get started! And be sure to leave a review.

I neglected to consider the number of original characters required before embarking on this adventure and therefore decided that playing Quidditch into your early forties, as Emma Gordon does, would not be a stretch given the increased lifespan of wizards and their apparent resilience to injury. (Emma appears in my story "Sharing Life Together.") Finally, I corrected a continuity error from the last chapter regarding who has prefect patrol, so if you're interested you can reread the last four lines of "_Thursday afternoon, the Arithmancy corridor_."

Enjoy!

* * *

_Thursday evening_

_the Hogwarts grounds_

James, Al, and Louis exited the castle steps in time to see Ginny turn the corner. She paced the space between the Great Hall and one of the flanking towers and rounded on them as soon as they approached.

"You mean to tell me—" She pointed back towards the Entrance Hall— "that after being _tortured_, I'm not allowed to call them _reptiles_? That those—those—_snakes_ are protected by some stupid rule? I wasn't allowed to fight with magic, and now I'm not even allowed to fight with words?" Her face was bright red now, her voice tight and shrill.

"Mum, those aren't—"

"If it weren't for McGonagall, I would have been—"

"What's going on?" Rose came around the corner. "CeCe said—Aunt Ginny, are you okay?"

"No, I'm bloody well not okay! Torture, and these prats are worried about house points!" She waved her hands at James, Al, and Louis.

"Should we get somebody?" Al said, eyeing his mother with alarm.

_Dad,_ James thought, but that was impossible. "Louis, go get Lily."

"No!" Ginny lunged and grabbed Louis's arm—painfully, by his expression. "Not Lily."

"Get Longbottom," Rose ordered, stepping closer. "Or Madame Branstone, or Professor Goldstein. McGonagall. Anybody that was here when she was."

Ginny was crying now, curled into herself with her hands over her face. James's hands were like ice. He had never seen his mother cry, not like this. Sometimes a few quiet tears at the remembrance ceremonies, but not like this. Not like she was scared and vulnerable. James suddenly realized how small she was.

"It's all right, Aunt Ginny," Rose said, putting an arm around her. She glared at James and waved him closer. "James is right here, see? We won't leave you by yourself."

James put a tentative hand on his mother's shoulder, and she turned into his chest. Mimicking what he'd seen his dad do with Lily, James put one arm around Ginny's back and stroked her hair with the other. "It's all right, Mum. They can't hurt you. I won't let anyone hurt you."

"Me, either," Al said, crowding close.

Frank and Professor Longbottom came running up.

"Oh, I'm sorry," Longbottom panted. "Frank said I could find Ginny Weasley here—you know, the girl who named Dumbledore's Army. The one who drew a phoenix on the wall right outside the Slytherin common room."

Ginny quieted a bit, peering around James. He turned so she was facing Longbottom.

"Bold as brass, she was, with her back to a roomful of enemies and some measly fourth year standing guard. You've got ginger hair, but you don't look a thing like her."

She sniffed. "I'm sorry." She took a step back and wiped her face, then began fussing with the damp shoulder of James's robes.

"It's fine, Mum. Here." He conjured her a handkerchief.

Madame Branstone, the school nurse, appeared, trailed by Louis, Fred, and Hugo.

"Oh, for Merlin's sake. Can't a girl have a crying jag without the whole world knowing about it?"

"Ginny, why don't you come up to my office?" Madame Branstone said. "I can—"

"No," Ginny said, and James was relieved to hear the familiar stubbornness. "I'm perfectly fine, Ellie, just embarrassed, is all."

"Just a quick exam—"

"No. It's nothing."

Madame Branstone gave her a shrewd look. "You'll come see me if you're not feeling well tomorrow?"

Ginny's shoulders relaxed. "I will. I promise."

"Very well, then. Children, inside please."

Frank, Louis, Fred, and Hugo obeyed, but James, Al, and Rose remained close to Ginny.

"Run along, Rosie," Ginny said, giving her hand a squeeze. "Thank you for helping, but I'm fine now."

Rose did not look convinced, but she followed Madame Branstone's beckoning gesture, looking back over her shoulder before she turned out of sight.

"Let's go up to my office," Longbottom said.

He led the way into the castle, across the less-crowded Entrance Hall (where they still drew several curious looks) and up the stairs. James and Al let Ginny take the seat closest to the fire, and Longbottom conjured another chair.

"Can I Floo-call Harry?"

"Of course you can. The brown jar on the mantel."

But Ginny did not stick her head into the emerald flames after calling out their address; she stepped into the fireplace and spun out of sight. Longbottom sighed.

"What the hell was that about?" James demanded.

"What happened?"

"I got heckled by some Slytherins, she snapped back at them, and when we tried to explain the rule about no House-related insults—"

"She freaked out," Al said. "Started yelling about snakes and detentions and _Crucio."_

Longbottom sighed again, rubbing his temples. "What have your parents told you about the last year of the war? Here, at Hogwarts?"

James and Al looked at each other. "Not much," James said.

"Did she really name Dumbledore's Army?" Al said. "Not Dad?"

Longbottom smiled. "No, it was your mum. And she came up with our slogan that last year too: 'Dumbledore's Army, Still Recruiting.' You know Death Eaters taught at Hogwarts?"

James and Al nodded.

"Well, DADA became simply the Dark Arts. After a few weeks we were assigned to perform spells on each other, and especially to anyone who had earned detention. Including the Cruciatus Curse."

"Mum was tortured?"

"More than once. Most of us were."

"By Slytherins," James guessed.

"Yes. Sometimes by the Carrows, but most often by sixth- and seventh-year pupils. The occasional Hufflepuff or Ravenclaw who had been bullied into it, but mostly Slytherins. Some of them got pretty good at it after a while."

"Shit, no wonder she hates them," Al breathed.

"She doesn't hate them."

"She can't sit with her back to them," James pointed out. He had noticed that last weekend, that no matter where he sat at the Gryffindor table, his mother walked to the far side.

"Could you?"

"No. I guess not."

"It was a Slytherin who tried to turn your dad in to Voldemort the night of the Final Battle, and McGonagall had them evacuated from the school. Even before the underage kids, all the Slytherins were escorted out. Not to mention that Voldemort himself was the Heir of Slytherin. And your mum's horribly conflicted about your sister," Longbottom added, "so you are not to breathe a word of this to Lily, do you understand?"

James and Al nodded.

"Why was Mum tortured?" Al asked. "Was it because of Dumbledore's Army? That phoenix you mentioned?"

"Sometimes. In the beginning it was for uniform violations."

"Uniform violations?" James and Al said together.

"She was fond of wearing your dad's Quidditch jerseys or one of the jumpers your grandmother made him."

"And they hexed her because of her relationship with Dad."

"Because she was bold enough to declare her support publicly, yes."

"She said—she was really angry about the prank on McGonagall, and—"

"A lot of us were angry about that, James."

He squirmed a bit under the dark look but went on. "When Mum first got here, she said McGonagall was a bigger war heroine than anyone who hadn't been at Hogwarts could understand."

"That's true. She saved our lives more than once."

"Your lives?" Al said faintly.

"I believe so, Al. McGonagall often interrupted the torture sessions, or covered for us when we were doing something for the DA, or just plain got in the way."

"She said—tonight, Mum said that if it hadn't been for McGonagall, she would have been…."

"What?"

"I don't know. That's when Rose showed up."

Longbottom stared into the fire, a muscle in his jaw ticking. The silence stretched thin, and still he didn't speak.

"We tried to protect them as much as we could, but … all the witches took a lot of harassment that year. We learned if no one was being injured to keep our mouths shut. They liked to torture the younger kids to manipulate us."

Longbottom's hands were laced together, the knuckles white, and James realized he was gripping the seat of his own chair.

"Didn't she hex any of them?" Al said.

Longbottom snorted. "Show up to detention with a wand in your pocket and you earned yourself another one. And you know the rule about magic in the corridors. There wasn't a single pupil who could have got within ten feet of Ginny with a wand and they knew it.

"Your mother—damned defiant, she was. She relied too heavily on her pure-blood status not to be seriously harmed. I tried to warn her, but she wouldn't listen. I wasn't blunt enough, I guess. It was McGonagall who convinced her if she didn't lay off, she was going to end up … hurt."

Longbottom's tone laced the word with meaning and James swore.

"What about Snape?" Al said angrily. "He was Headmaster, he could have stopped it, why didn't he—"

"He did stop some of it, Al," Longbottom said gently. "He set an early curfew so we would be in our common rooms more and out of the Carrows' reach. He ordered Ginny's dormitory searched and everything of Harry's confiscated, which seemed cruel at the time, but as I said, kept her out of trouble. He interrupted one of my detentions with a staff meeting. He acted where he could, but he had to maintain the pretense that he was working for Voldemort."

Al sat back and crossed his arms, looking mutinous.

"And now Lily's a Slytherin, and Mum's trying to hide her feelings to support Lils. That's why she wouldn't let Louis go get her. She didn't want Lily to know. Do you think she's okay?" James stared into the fire, now burning merrily in shades of crimson and gold.

"Absolutely. That was a long time ago, and tonight she got caught by surprise. She'll be more embarrassed than anything."

"Mum said she was thinking about seeing Dad tomorrow," James said. "She might just spend the night and go to the Harpies' practice from there."

"If I hear from her, I'll let you know. Okay?"

James and Al stood to leave. James turned back at the door. "Professor? Thank you. For helping her."

"Any time, James."

()()()()

_Friday afternoon_

_the Owlery_

_Dear Aunt Hermione,_

_How are you? I've been wanting to write since Sunday but with Mum following me everywhere, it's been impossible. I don't want her to know what I'm writing you about, which you will understand as soon as you see it. Don't worry, it's nothing bad. I wanted to ask you to make a Christmas jumper for my best mate, Cameron Davies. His parents are divorced and his mum is … well, "flighty," to use Cam's description, and with Mum here fussing over me all the time, I think it's made him lonesome for his own mum (she was in Indonesia over summer hols). It's hit or miss whether or not his mum remembers to send him anything for Christmas, so I thought it would be nice for him to have an extra present. You know Mum can't knit anything that isn't square._

_Mum showed me the lavatory where you brewed Polyjuice Potion as a second-year—I'm impressed! Don't feel bad about the cat hair. Anybody could have made that mistake. The Polyjuice was quite an accomplishment, so I've included a small congratulations gift._

_Love from,_

_Your godson,_

_James_

He had added the godson reminder just in case she was feeling overwhelmed by her jumper-making duties this year. With so many people in the family, all the aunts helped, but Aunt Hermione was one of the best. James frowned. He should have included something about her stellar skills, but it would be too obvious as a postscript. Hopefully he'd made Cameron sound sympathetic enough. James folded the letter, placed it inside the box beside the carefully wrapped catnip (rescued from Professor Burke's storage cupboard last week), and scribbled the address on the outside before securing it to the legs of his owl and carrying him to the window.

()()()()

_Friday afternoon_

_the Hogwarts grounds_

Ginny had timed her return to Hogwarts to coincide with the dismissal of Lily's Care of Magical Creatures lesson and was pleased to see a trail of pupils exiting the Forbidden Forest as she walked up the drive. Lily spoke a few words to her friends and broke off to meet her.

"Hi, Mum. Is everything okay?"

Ginny smiled. "Of course. Why wouldn't it be?" _Just because I lost it in front of half the school last night…._

Lily turned towards the castle, dragging her steps, keeping their conversation out of earshot. "I heard you argued with Bletchley and Warrington, and you weren't at breakfast this morning."

"I went to the Harpies' and the Arrows' practices today."

"How was it?" Lily said eagerly. "Is Emma's ankle healed?"

Emma Gordon was the oldest member of the Harpies, the last of Ginny's teammates still playing.

"She flew very well in warm-ups, but she's not on the roster yet."

"What about—"

"You can read about it tomorrow morning like everyone else," Ginny said, keeping her tone light to soften the brush-off. "I need to speak to—Bletchley and Warrington, you said? I was hoping you would introduce me."

"I don't know them that well. They're in Al's year."

"Can you point them out, at least?"

"I suppose so." Lily pulled open the front doors. "Why?"

"I owe them an apology," Ginny admitted.

"I thought you thought Gryffindors didn't give Slytherins the time of day."

"Things change."

Lily made a face.

"Have we really done that bad a job of hiding it?"

"I know you don't care that I'm in Slytherin, but you still think Gryffindor House is the best."

"You would too, if you'd been Sorted there."

Lily harrumphed.

They were in the dungeons now, winding through corridors Ginny had only been in during detentions in sixth year.

Lily stopped abruptly. "Mum, what are you doing?"

"I'm following you." She had, in fact, been waiting for Lily's protest for a while now.

"But I'm going to my common room."

"I know."

Lily shifted her rucksack higher on her shoulder. "You can't come to my common room."

"I've been in James and Al's common room," Ginny said innocently.

"Yes, but they're Gryffindors," Lily said, looking around the deserted corridor.

"So?"

"So, you are too. You went to _your_ common room. There's nothing special about that."

"I bet your common room is special," Ginny said. "Can you see the Giant Squid? Or the merpeople?"

There was a grinding noise and a couple exited hand-in-hand through a gap in the wall ahead of them. Lily gave them a tight smile and pulled Ginny around a corner.

"You stay here," she whispered.

"But I want to see!"

"Mum! I can't bring a _Gryffindor_ into the Slytherin common room!" Lily's eyes were wide, her mouth pursed at the very thought.

Ginny stepped into the hallway again, looking left and right. "I don't see a portrait. How do you know where the entrance is?"

Lily yanked on her arm, hissing like a—well, like a snake. "I'm not telling! Get back here before someone else sees you."

"How do you get in if there's not a password? Is there a question? The Ravenclaw door knocker asks you a question, and you can't come in until you get it right."

"No, there's not a question, just—" Lily put one hand to her forehead and closed her eyes in a gesture eerily reminiscent of her uncle Percy. Ginny had to suck in her cheeks to hide her smile as Lily opened her eyes again.

"You are a Gryffindor, and Gryffindors are not allowed in the Slytherin common room. Even first-years know that, Mum."

"I'm not a Gryffindor any more. Not for more than twenty years."

Lily crossed her arms and looked down her nose at the scarlet and gold rosette on the chest of Ginny's robes, and she knew the game was up.

"You're no fun." Ginny pouted.

"And you're a pest," Lily retorted. "Just stay here, okay? I'll find out if Bletchley and Warrington are in there."

Bletchley and Warrington were indeed in their common room, for they appeared behind Lily just a few minutes later.

"I'm sorry," Ginny said immediately, even before Lily could make introductions. "I shouldn't have lost my temper."

"Well, we probably shouldn't have said anything about Potter in front of his mum," said the taller of the two.

"No, probably not," Ginny said dryly.

"Is it true you beat Potter and Davies to the seventh floor?"

"What?"

"Potter—Al, I mean—he said you know more of Hogwarts' secrets than anyone."

"Well, if you mean secret passageways, I know my share. Which one of you is which?"

The two boys introduced themselves, then were joined by friends heading to the Great Hall for dinner. Introductions were made again, and Lily mentioned Ginny had just come from the Arrows' practice. Judging from the gleam in her daughter's eye at the boy's enthusiasm, Lily knew he was an Arrows fan. When two girls joined the little group, one of whom Ginny had seen in the prefects' meeting, the side corridor became rather crowded, and Ginny accepted their invitation to join them for dinner.

If it had been disturbing sitting with her back to the Slytherin table, it was even weirder to be sitting at it. But the children were including Lily in their conversation, and she was basking in the attention from the older pupils, especially—Aidan? No, Elliot. The Arrows fan. He was good-looking; he reminded Ginny of Sirius a bit, with his artfully mussed hair, high cheekbones, and devil-may-care attitude. These kids had no interest in her role in the war or her family. They asked what it was like to play for Gwenog Jones, and if Oliver Wood really wore the same socks throughout playoffs, and Ginny's favorite Chaser play.

Judging from the wide smile on Lily's face and the way her daughter was sticking right beside her, Ginny's popularity was finally earning her points for being the cool mum.


	11. Chapter 11

A/N: Nobody got ominous vibes from James's letter to Hermione? No one?

* * *

_Friday evening_

_the Quidditch pitch_

The Slytherins, Freddie, and Hugo were already waiting when James and Sam arrived for their first joint practice. Cameron, Nate, and Evan joined the other Gryffindors in the stands. As James had expected, there were a lot of spectators, even more than yesterday. He wasn't sure if they were here for the novelty of Gryffindor and Slytherin working together or simply because it was another opportunity to see Ginny fly.

"What's _she_ doing here?"

"_She_ is following James. Ginny Potter." She offered her hand to the Slytherin captain.

He hesitated, then shook it. "Brad Derrick. You're not running this practice."

"Of course not. I'm not the captain," she said cooly.

"But I am," James said. "Let's start with a couple of warm-up laps and then some Quaffle passes."

"Maybe you Gryffindors start like that, but we like to actually play the game," Derrick sneered.

"But we've never played together," James said calmly. He'd had to cancel their original first practice because of his Quidditch ban and had expected the attitude from Derrick, but was determined not to play into it. "If you have a better idea for team unity, I'm open."

"Is that a Firestar?" Ginny said, staring at the broomstick in the hands of the Slytherin beater, Aidan Miles.

"Brand new," Miles said. "Just got it this morning."

"Those aren't even out for beta testing yet," Ginny said, taking a few steps forward, her eyes still fixed on the broom.

"They are now. My dad is friends with the owner," Miles bragged. "He arranged for me to be a tester."

"At fifteen?" Freddie said skeptically. "New brooms usually go to someone who has played professional Quidditch. Aunt Ginny was one of the first to fly the Nova line when Nimbus relaunched."

"Give it a go," Miles said, ignoring Freddie and offering the broom to Ginny. "Its turning radius and burst acceleration is supposed to be even better than the old Firebolts."

"Really?" Ginny's face lit up, and she looked at Miles for the first time.

"Why not? The whole school's been dying to see you fly for a week."

"Cheers!"

Ginny was halfway to the goalposts before anyone in the crowd realized who was flying. James heard the gasps and saw the nudging elbows and pointing fingers as she climbed high above the stands in a blur of speed. She circled the pitch once, tipped the broom in a sharp dive, and leveled off just in time to sail straight through the center goal hoop.

"Not bad, for a girl," Derrick said.

"Damn good for anyone," Lily said hotly. "Montrose's Seeker broke his arm trying that move last summer."

"She's good, all right," Miles said. "Looks good too, with my broomstick between her legs."

James turned, but before he could say anything, Miles continued, smirking.

"I can think of something else—"

()()()()

_Friday evening_

_the Headmistress's office_

Ginny stared at the carpet between her feet, trying not to attract McGonagall's attention.

"Four on two! What kind of fairness is that? This team was formed for—what purpose, Mr. Potter?"

"Inter-house unity," James muttered.

Standing behind her desk, McGonagall gave him her beady-eyed stare, and he spoke a little louder.

"To promote inter-house unity, Professor."

"Inter-house unity." Her nostrils flared. "And how, may I ask, is pummeling each other at Quidditch practice going to promote that?"

Ginny caught James's eye.

"Well, Lily was with us, Professor."

Ginny heard Neville suck in a breath of laughter beside her, but he passed it off as a cough. McGonagall didn't spare him a glance.

"Inter-house unity in assaulting a fellow team member is not what I am looking for, Mr. Potter. Especially not in a captain and prefect, and I'm sure Professor Longbottom would agree."

"Of course, Headmistress."

"Considering that you never even made it onto the pitch, what could have possibly gone so wrong?"

Ginny gripped the skirt of her robes. Here it came.

"Miles insulted my mother, Professor. He set her up."

James was exactly right; she had been set up, and worse still, she had walked right into it. Couldn't have made it easier for the boy.

"Indeed." McGonagall's stare shifted to Ginny. "So, am I to conclude that had your mother not been here, your Quidditch practice with Slytherin House would have progressed without incident?" She spoke to James, but Ginny was bearing the force of that pointed glare, which was none the weaker for passing through square-rimmed spectacles.

"I think we would at least have made it onto the pitch, Professor."

"Mmm. Mrs. Potter, do you remember why I was against this shadowy plan of yours?"

"You thought if I shadowed—" Ginny put the tiniest emphasis on the word, just enough to let McGonagall know she knew what she was doing— "James that my presence would cause a 'considerable disturbance'."

"A considerable disturbance," McGonagall repeated, leaning forward with her hands flat on her desktop. "And do you think tonight qualifies?"

"I—"

"Six pupils brawling, three people treated in the hospital wing, and a crowd of witnesses. How many witnesses do you think there were, Professor Longbottom?"

Neville looked uncomfortable. "Maybe two hundred?"

"Two hundred. Two hundred eyewitnesses, who will return to each of their four house common rooms and relay the story with great enthusiasm and little attention to detail. Would you call that a considerable disturbance, Mrs. Potter?"

"Yes, Professor."

"And what else did I say?"

"Not to expect you to clean up my mess."

"When. This. Goes. Bad, not to expect me to clean up your mess. When, Mrs. Potter, not if. And I have been proven correct tonight, have I not?"

"Yes, Professor."

"Mr. Potter, twenty points from Gryffindor."

James let out a quiet breath.

"_Each_," McGonagall said, pressing her lips into a thin line.

Neville flinched.

"But, Professor, Miles started it—"

"Shall I add another twenty for insolence?"

Wisely, James said nothing.

"Mr. Potter, if I see you in this office again, there will be no need for your mother to follow you around this school because you will not be in it. Am I clear?"

For a moment, James looked like he was going to try to justify his actions again, but he, like three generations of Hogwarts pupils before him, withered under Minerva McGonagall's sharp gaze.

"Yes, Professor."

"You are dismissed."

Ginny and Neville did not move. McGonagall waited for several seconds after the door closed, but Ginny was much too experienced at mischief-making (and intimidating mischief-makers) to fill the silence. McGonagall finally dropped her assertive posture and sank into her chair.

"For Godric's sake, Ginny," she said irritably, flicking a stray quill feather off her desk.

"I know. I'm sorry. I walked right into it. But Professor, Aidan Miles had a Firestar, and they're not even—"

"I don't care. It won't matter that I spent fifteen minutes yelling at James and took sixty points from Gryffindor, all the pupils will consider tonight the epitome of greatness to be imitated at the first opportunity, and if we are not careful, the inter-house match will be a positive riot."

"Surely that's—"

"And you were a lot of help," McGonagall said crossly to Neville.

"I helped a lot. I didn't laugh."

She scowled.

"'Lily was with us'?"

McGonagall scoffed, but Ginny noticed her lips weren't quite so thin.

"He takes after his father, I'm afraid," Ginny said apologetically. But she had underestimated McGonagall's temper.

"And his mother, and his uncles, and his godparents, and his grandfather, and his namesake, and every other Weasley or Potter that has crossed the threshold of this castle in the sixty-five years I've been teaching here!" She thumped her walking stick and Ginny jumped. "I think I'll write to your mother, Ginny Weasley Potter."

Ginny gaped, speechless. There was a sputtering sound and she turned.

Neville was laughing, his face pink with the effort of holding it in. He pointed at Ginny. "You—you—you—"

Dumbfounded, she turned back to Professor McGonagall, who still looked cross but had placed her walking stick across her desk.

"Wha—"

"You should—have seen—your face," Neville gasped, bent over and clutching the back of a chair for support. "When—when Minerva said—"

Ginny felt the heat climbing her neck, spreading rapidly up her face. She smacked Neville, who didn't seem to notice. "That's not funny!"

"Actually, it was," McGonagall said dryly. "I have not seen that expression on someone over the age of eighteen in a very, very long time. Sit down, Neville, before you fall over."

Still chuckling, Neville clawed his way into a chair.

Watching the amusement of her old friend, Ginny began to see the humor. "Twenty years and three children, and all I could think was what Mum would say if McGonagall wrote home that I'd been caught riding some wizard's broomstick."

This set Neville off again, as Ginny had intended.

"Merlin, Gin-Ginny, stop," he begged, tears rolling down his round face.

"I still haven't ruled it out," McGonagall said. "Standing on tables, showing off in lessons, magic in the corridors, insulting pupils, Muggle dueling!"

Ginny groaned, slouching into the seat beside Neville. "Forget Mum, Harry is going to kill me. Please tell me no one had a camera."

Neville pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his eyes. "Are you kidding? Everyone had their cameras out. I just wish I had a picture of—of—" He pointed at Ginny again.

"Oh, come on. You've met my mother. She's an absolute terror."

"_You're_ an absolute terror," Neville said. "That's what makes it so funny."

"I am not!"

"Ginny, did you see those boys? They were tripping over each other to get away from you."

"I should go back so James doesn't suspect all three of us of conspiring against him."

"In all seriousness, Mrs. Potter—" Ginny registered the return of her surname— "I've written your mother dozens of letters over the years. One more will not be a hardship."

"Yes, Professor."

James waited beside the gargoyle.

"I'm sorry," Ginny said quietly as they began walking back to Gryffindor Tower.

"It's not your fault."

But he sounded sullen and resentful, as if he did consider it her fault. And he had good reason. All those years playing Quidditch, all her carefulness to avoid innuendo and double entendres with the male players and the media, and she forgot it all at the sight of a new broomstick.

"I should have known better. I do know better. What did he say?"

James shrugged.

"I already know it was something rude. What was it?"

"I'm not repeating it."

"Yes, James, because I grew up with six brothers and played professionally, but I've never heard a dirty Quidditch joke," Ginny said sarcastically.

"You're still my mother," he said stubbornly.

She smiled. "Sometimes, you remind me a lot of your dad."

He looked down and away, avoiding her gaze.

"It's a compliment, James. Especially from me."

He made a face but didn't protest.

"You invited me to practice, and I ruined it for you. I really am sorry."

"It was an accident this time."

"This time?" she said, amused.

"Aren't you here especially to make things difficult for me?"

"To a point," she admitted. "But not to honestly get you in trouble and lose house points and be an unpleasant spectacle."

"Watching you fly isn't an unpleasant spectacle," he said grudgingly.

They stopped outside the Fat Lady's portrait.

"Do you want me to stay or go?" she said.

He raised his brows. "I get a choice?"

"This was my misbehavior."

"Go. Everyone will be all over you if you show up tonight. Maybe by tomorrow it will have died down some."

"All right. I'm going to the Wasps' practice in the morning, so I'll see you tomorrow afternoon." Longing for contact, she reached out and squeezed his hand. "Goodnight."

"Goodnight, Mum."

()()()()

_Saturday morning_

_the library_

James looked up from his Potions text to answer Daisy Carmichael's question. "I've got to go," he said abruptly, throwing his notes and quill into his bag and hurrying round the table.

Harry Potter had just entered the library.

He turned when he saw James approaching and exited the library to wait for him. James appreciated this small gesture, as if his father didn't want to call any more attention to himself than necessary. Not that it could be helped, but still … at least he wasn't rubbing it in like his mum. They walked through the castle in silence, Harry's steps quick and sure. It wasn't until they left the castle and circled around the greenhouses that he spoke.

"What happened?"

"Ask Neville."

Harry ignored the familiarity, which was tolerated at home but forbidden at school. "I'm asking you."

James said nothing.

"McGonagall's letter said you got into a fight on the Quidditch pitch."

Silence.

"About?"

He shrugged.

"Look, James, I know it had something to do with your mother, and I know you were defending her."

"How do you know that?"

"Let's just say I was once in McGonagall's office after a fight on the pitch. Not to mention I have rather a lot of experience with wizards' reactions to your mum in uniform."

"She wasn't in uniform."

Harry raised one eyebrow, and James realized he'd been tricked into revealing information.

"What happened?"

"Aidan Miles has one of the new Firestars."

Harry groaned. "Don't tell me she flew his broomstick."

James nodded. "She did her dive-and-goal, and then—" He felt his ears get warm and studied his trainers. "Then he said—"

"I know what he said." Harry sounded exasperated.

"You do?" He looked up in surprise.

"Sex is not a recent invention, James."

"So anyways," James said hastily, "I hit him, and Freddie and Hugo joined in and Lily too, and then I jumped Derrick because he took a swing at Lils. I guess Mum saw us fighting because she separated us with a revulsion jinx before she even landed. Then Professor Longbottom and Professor Fawley came over and hauled us all up to the hospital wing. McGonagall sent a message that she wanted to see me and Mum, so Longbottom sent the others with Fawley but took us to the Headmistress's office. She took twenty points from each of us and Fawley did too!"

"That's nothing. Fred and George and I got a lifetime ban."

"Professor McGonagall kicked you off the team?"

"No, not Professor McGonagall. Umbridge. That's when we found out your mother could play. She took my spot as Seeker."

"She's been a real pain in the—"

Harry gave him a warning look.

"Neck. I mean, more than usual." He huffed impatiently. "She's treating me like a baby. She even tried to follow me into the boys' dormitory!"

"Why was that?"

James realized his mistake too late. "I, er, she.…" No way was he telling his dad what really happened; Harry would go spare, and James would end up swimming with the Giant Squid. If he were lucky. "I mouthed off," he muttered.

Harry turned and began walking along the edge of the Forbidden Forest. "Your mum was awfully tight-lipped when she came home Thursday night. She said you weren't cooperating, but she wouldn't give any details."

James stuffed his hands in his pockets. "Did she tell you what happened with the Slytherins?"

"Yes."

"Professor Longbottom told us a bit about what happened at Hogwarts during the war. He said the Slytherins were allowed to torture students."

"Yes."

"And the witches…." James trailed off at the look on Harry's face. Perhaps it was a good thing his dad hadn't been here that night, after all. "It's just … I think being here is hard for her. Can't you get her to go home?"

"That's your job, not mine."

"She's been insufferable! I didn't know about her ultimatum when I put the catnip in the Transfiguration classroom. I hadn't got the Howler yet! McGonagall and Longbottom have both been riding me all term, and I couldn't get away from Mum for two seconds because the Fat Lady lets her into the common room and McGonagall took the Cloak and the map!"

"James, this is really very simple. Stop fighting your mother and do what you're supposed to do and she'll go home."

"She shouldn't even be here anyway," he said, kicking a stray pinecone. "Just because she played Quidditch and is married to _you_, that doesn't give her the right to come in here and tell me what to do."

"She is your mother," Harry said firmly. "She has every right. You're lucky to have someone who cares about what you're doing."

James kicked the pinecone again. He should have known better. He knew it had been awful for his dad, growing up without a mum, but Harry didn't understand it could be awful growing up _with_ a mum too. They walked in silence for a bit, and when James made an awkward kick off the toe of his shoe, sending the pinecone dancing towards the forest, Harry ran ahead and kicked it back. They played for a few minutes, kicking the cone back and forth, dodging in and out of each others' legs until it was a mere collection of chips too small to maneuver.

"What's really bothering you, James? And don't say it's your mum, because you've had an attitude ever since the summer."

"Nothing."

"Nothing doesn't end with both of your parents at Hogwarts."

"I didn't ask you to be here!"

"With you, Lily, _and_ your mum in trouble, I didn't have much of a choice. Not to mention you persisted in pranks and detentions and neglecting your schoolwork and ignored every letter sent by either of us, or anyone else in the family for that matter, until your mother felt she needed to supervise you personally."

"Well, she doesn't!"

His dad put a hand on his shoulder. James tried to shrug it off, but Harry tightened his grip. "Cooperate, James. Show us you can act your age. If you can't handle the responsibilities of school and Quidditch Captain and prefect, how can I expect you to handle the Auror Academy?"

"I don't care about being prefect. You can have my badge!"

Harry dropped his hand. "What's wrong with being prefect?"

"You weren't. Nor Mum, neither."

"No," Harry agreed. "Nor my dad, nor Sirius."

"I don't care about them!" James said impatiently, then backtracked when he saw Harry flinch. "I'm sorry, it's just—" He turned his back, staring into the forest.

"Just what?"

He gritted his teeth and tried a change of subject. "What was your fight about?"

"What?"

"Your fight on the Quidditch pitch. Was it about Mum?"

"No, your grandmother. Both your grandmothers, actually. We had just beaten Slytherin and Malfoy insulted Ron and Fred and George's mum, then mine."

Once again, James was reminded of the animosity that had existed between his family and various members of Slytherin House.

"How long are you here for?"

"Depends."

James turned back around. "On?"

"Your mum and the Headmistress."

"I don't get a say?"

"Not with the way your behavior's been, no."

"Yeah, well, don't bother saying goodbye." And he stalked off towards the lake.

()()()()

_Saturday afternoon_

_Ginny's guest suite_

Harry waited in Ginny's suite when she opened the door.

"Harry!" Her face lit up, and his spirits lifted as they always did at the sight of her.

"I brought you a present," he said, accepting her hug and returning her kiss. "Here."

"My broomstick!" Ginny shrieked, so loudly that Harry winced. "Oh, Harry!"

She hugged him again, still clutching the broom, and he laughed.

"Did you bring yours?"

"What do you think?"

She grinned.

"How were the Wasps?"

"All buzz and no sting, as usual. Have you seen James?"

Harry nodded.

"Any luck?"

"None."

Ginny sighed and dropped into a chair. "I don't know what to do, Harry. I really, really don't."

"Maybe he needs a girlfriend."

Ginny gaped at him. "Whatever makes you say that?"

"Well … my dad … he was a bit of a prat growing up. Always getting into trouble, picking on other people, and—"

Ginny still looked incredulous.

Harry cleared his throat. "It's just … well, he wanted to impress my mum, didn't he? And so he changed his behavior, straightened up, and ended up being picked for Head Boy even though he hadn't been a prefect."

"Harry … James was in love with Lily. That's rather different than simply having a girlfriend. I've been here for a week. If James—our James—felt that strongly about someone, I would know."

Harry frowned. "What about—who was that girl Neville mentioned in his letter?"

"Holly Jordan. And Neville was wrong, it's Cameron who fancies Holly."

"Oh." Well, Ginny would know.

"I really think a girl is the _last_ thing James needs to be worrying about right now."

"You know he was defending you last night, right?"

"I know. I shouldn't have—"

"Ridden another wizard's broomstick?"

She wrinkled her nose. "It sounds so vulgar when you say it like that."

"I'm sure he was vulgar."

"Neville would have handled it, but McGonagall heard and called us to her office. She even threatened to write to Mum-my mum! She's pretty pissed at me."

"I could tell," Harry said dryly. "It was … an interesting letter. I doubt this morning's article helped much." There had been a picture of Ginny scattering a clump of wrestling boys in this morning's _Prophet_, complete with accusations of favoritism and hints of what other chaos McGonagall was hiding within the school.

Ginny winced. "She'll want to see you. Us."

"Later. Listen, I was thinking—what do you think about asking Ron to come up?"

Ginny looked surprised. "Here, at Hogwarts? Don't you think that's pushing McGonagall a bit far?"

"No, not here. Hogsmeade. Let him take James out of the castle, give him a bit of a break. He won't talk to either of us, but maybe he'll talk to Ron."

"What makes you say that?"

Harry hesitated. Ginny was generally much better at understanding their children's motivations, but he had been Ron's best mate since they were younger than James, and something about James's attitude….

"I think maybe he's feeling the pressure. You know, of so much to live up to. Not just me and you, but Ron and Hermione and—"

"Then how is Ron going to help?"

"Because Ron knows what that's like. You were the daughter, it was different for you, but Ron had to live in the shadow of all your brothers and me too. And—well, I don't know how to help James deal with you. With a mother."

Ginny said nothing, just stared at him for a moment. "All right. Let's Floo-call him. But James has to think this is Ron's idea—he can't know that we asked him to talk to him."

"Agreed."

* * *

a/n: I finished Camp NaNo early and decided to celebrate with an early update :D I was so looking forward to changing my icon to a winner's badge, but they're not available until Monday. What's up with that? I think I have a workable first draft of the 8th Year fic (although I haven't read the whole thing yet) and am hoping to have it ready to go in time to start right after Misbehavior ends. No promises, but that's the goal.

Welcome and thank you to new followers and reviewers!


	12. Chapter 12

_Saturday evening_

_Gryffindor Common Room_

James watched Frank Longbottom choose a spot for his shot. The sixth and seventh year boys were playing gobstones, but James pleaded out. His parents had joined him for a quiet family dinner at one end of the Gryffindor table, escorted him back to the Tower (where Harry had a brief conversation with a delighted Fat Lady), and returned to their room. James was relieved at the reprieve and doing his best not to think about why it had been given.

"Oi, Potter!"

He turned round.

"This is for you." One of the boys sitting by a window passed him an envelope.

"Who's it from?" Cameron said. "Both your parents are here."

"I dunno." James opened the oversized envelope and turned it upside down. A note and a blank piece of parchment fell out.

"Is that—"

"It's the map!"

"Do you think your dad—"

"No way. Not after what I said today." James felt badly about that. Harry was just trying to help, and he'd made an effort not to draw more attention to himself than necessary. He'd even cast a _Muffliato_ at dinner. Despite the stares and the craning necks, they hadn't been disturbed. The pupils seemed more reluctant to approach Harry than they had been with Ginny. James unfolded the note.

_the Three Broomsticks_

_Tonight, 10 pm_

_Uncle Ron_

Cameron had been reading over James's shoulder. "The Three Broomsticks? Is he daft? Your parents will _kill_ you. McGonagall said you'd be expelled if you were in her office again, and you know if you get caught out of the castle after curfew, you're going to end up in the Headmistress's office!"

"I won't get caught, not with the map."

"James—"

"I'm going," he said defiantly.

Cameron looked doubtfully at the parchment. "Are you sure that's from your uncle?"

"Who else would it be?"

"How did he get the map? McGonagall gave it to your mum."

"Who cares?"

"You don't think your mum and dad put him up to it? You know, to talk sense into you, or whatever?"

"And asked him to meet me in Hogsmeade after curfew? No way."

"He didn't give you much time," Cameron said, looking at his watch. "It takes almost an hour just to get to Honeydukes."

"Cover for me, will you?"

"'Course."

James made sure his brother was occupied and slipped through the portrait hole.

()()()()

_Saturday night_

_the Three Broomsticks_

The pub was packed. James hesitated at the entrance, unsure if he should wait here or go inside. A couple exited, the witch stumbling in high heels and the wizard leaning on her for support. James felt a hint of unease; he had never been in the Three Broomsticks—or any pub—this late, and it was obviously a different crowd than lunchtime on Hogwarts days. But the couple's exit had provided a rush of warmth into the frosty night, and buoyed by the thought of a butterbeer, he pulled open the door and squeezed his way around the bar.

Uncle Ron sat in a corner booth, his back to the wall and two shots of Firewhiskey on the table in front of him.

"Don't tell your mother," he said as James sat down. "Or—"

"Aunt Hermione. Yeah, I know." James picked up the glass and tossed it back. He managed to suppress the urge to cough—barely—but the effort forced tears out of his eyes. He blinked rapidly.

"You should have savored it," Uncle Ron said mildly, taking a sip of his own. "I'm not buying you another until you turn seventeen. _And_ you haven't been expelled."

It was a full minute before James trusted himself to speak without breathing fire. The drink burned all the way down to his stomach, and he was no longer cold. In fact, he didn't think he'd ever be cold again.

"Mum blabbed."

"You made the _Prophet_, mate."

"What?"

"Rosie didn't tell you?"

"Everyone's been avoiding me."

"Just the usual rubbish. Famous Ginny Potter, throwing her weight around, making special exception for her son." He caught the waitress's eye and ordered James a butterbeer.

"It's not rubbish. McGonagall would never let someone else's mum follow them around."

"Probably not."

"It's not fair!" James said, his uncle's calmness inflaming his irritation.

Ron raised one eyebrow. "That's the best you've got?"

James flushed, conscious of the childishness of that argument. "She's absolutely horrid, and when I tried to tell Dad, he said—"

"You were lucky to have a mum who cared about you."

"Yeah." The waitress set down his butterbeer, and James tried not to gulp it.

"Your dad used to give me these long, dark looks whenever I complained about my mum when we were growing up. Made me feel like shit."

"Pretty much," James agreed. "He doesn't understand that having a mum can suck too!"

Uncle Ron took another sip of his Firewhiskey. "No one knows better than I do how much of a pain in the arse your mum can be. Harry sees some of it, but she's nicer to him. Always has been."

Encouraged by the sympathy of the first person to not blindly defend his mother, James told his uncle all about the last ten days. Ron grimaced and groaned at all the right points in the story.

"So tell me this," he said, leaning against the wall and stretching his long legs towards the aisle. "If she's been that bad, why haven't you got shot of her?"

"Haven't you been listening? She won't let me alone!"

"What, she's going to follow you for the rest of the term? Be a bit difficult to keep her job and her marriage intact if she's living up here with you."

James scowled. His uncle was being deliberately obtuse. "She says she'll go home when she's convinced I'll be a good little prefect and not get in any more trouble."

"Then what's the big deal?"

James opened his mouth, then closed it. Uncle Ron had walked him in a neat little circle right to the heart of the problem.

James went on the offensive. "Why did you send me the map, then, if you think I should do what Mum wants? And ask me to meet you after curfew, and buy me a Firewhiskey when I'm still underage?"

"I asked you to meet me here because I didn't think you'd appreciate a third grown-up at school. I asked you to meet me tonight because it's not a school night, and I didn't want to wait for next weekend. I sent you the map so you could get in and out of the castle safely. I bought you a Firewhiskey because I was hoping we could talk man-to-man."

"We could've met tomorrow afternoon." James knew he'd already screwed up that last bit.

"How were you supposed to shake your mum, eh?"

"Well, it gets confusing! One minute you and Dad are telling all these stories of things you did, or the DA, or whoever, and the next minute I'm supposed to follow the rules and be good!"

Uncle Ron considered him for a moment. "That's a good point," he admitted. "The biggest problem this year, James, is the mean spirit behind your pranks."

"Nobody was supposed to get hurt!"

"You threw a firework in Potions and released a boggart in a room full of unprepared twelve-year-olds. McGonagall is nearly one hundred years old. What did you expect?"

"I just wanted…."

"What? Attention? You've got plenty of it now, and you don't seem to like it much."

"I just—"

"Wanted to make a name for yourself?"

"Maybe," James said sullenly.

"One that didn't have anything to do with your parents?"

He shrugged.

Ron was silent. James knew it was pointless to resist; Uncle Ron made a living teaching interrogation skills to Aurors. And James wanted someone, anyone, to understand.

"It doesn't matter what I do, somebody always has some comment about how I remind them of someone—Dad or Mum or you or Uncle Fred and Uncle George or even Louis, it never ends! I just want something that's mine."

"Then why are you playing Chaser? Your mum and Angelina both played Chaser for Gryffindor."

"Because I like Quidditch, and I like scoring points, and I thought being scared I might not be as good as they were was a stupid reason not to play!"

Ron savored the last of his Firewhiskey before speaking. "Let me make sure I have this straight. You want to do what you want, even if it's something someone else in the family is well-known for, without having anyone else, even people who know both you and the other person, say anything about that other famous person who is directly related to you."

James shifted in his seat. "It sounds stupid when you say it like that."

Uncle Ron sat up and leaned forward, resting both forearms on the table. "Listen, I understand what it's like to always be compared to somebody else. I had five talented brothers to live up to and a baby sister who was the apple of everyone's eye, not to mention one of my best mates was a genius and the other was the most famous wizard in Britain. No matter what I did, how skillful or impressive it was, it wasn't really, because Bill or Charlie or Percy or Fred or George had done it first. There were kids in Gryffindor who didn't even know my name—I was just somebody's little brother or Harry Potter's ginger mate. I hated it, but I couldn't change my family any more than you can. And your dad was always going to be famous, and Hermione was always going to be brilliant, so it was either learn to deal with that or stop being their friend."

"But I don't have a choice," James argued. "I'm always going to be their son. I can't stop."

"You can stop being a prick," Ron said bluntly. "You _will_ always be their son, and despite its occasional drawbacks, it has a hell of a lot of benefits, not the least of which is your parents love you like crazy."

James stared at his butterbeer, thinking of Cameron. James was honest enough to admit he had the better of their two situations, even with his mum at Hogwarts.

"I don't mind being known as Harry and Ginny Potter's son, not all the time. I just don't want that to be the _only_ thing I'm known for."

Uncle Ron smiled that patronizing smile ubiquitous to grown-ups. "You're a lot like them whether you see it or not. Your dad always thought it was stupid to be famous for not being murdered, especially once he'd done other stuff. But you're not making life easy for yourself."

"What do you mean?"

"Choosing the same things your parents did—Quidditch, the Aurors. You can't expect to do the same things and not be compared."

"If it wasn't them, it would be someone else! You, or Aunt Hermione, or—"

"Yes, it would. You're part of a large, well-known, and popular family. That's your life. Deal with it."

James scowled. "I thought you came here to help me."

"I am helping. I'm trying to get you to see that your behavior has been not only reckless and childish, but pointless. No matter what you do, good or bad, you're going to be compared to someone. Your parents, your godparents, your namesakes, _someone_. And I'll tell you right now, James—if you don't show some significant improvement in maturity, I won't even consider you for the Auror Academy. If you're thinking about joining because you want to prove you're as good as your dad, you can forget it."

James flinched.

"No, no, I don't mean you're not as good as him," Uncle Ron said hastily. "I mean that's a lousy reason to take up a dangerous and difficult career. Do you remember the summer after your first year, when you wanted to try out for the Quidditch team but couldn't decide which position?"

James nodded. "Someone in the family had already played every position. And for Gryffindor too."

"Do you remember what I said?"

"That I should pick the position I liked best because if I had fun playing, I would work hard and be good at it."

"And look at you—Captain this year. They don't give out captains' badges because somebody has famous parents."

"But Mum was Captain—Dad too!"

"That doesn't mean you didn't earn it, James."

He sat back. He'd never thought about it like that before. Although he'd been excited when the badge fell out of the envelope, once his parents started reminiscing, it just hadn't seemed special any more. Especially not when he found out Uncle Charlie and Aunt Angelina had been Gryffindor Quidditch Captains too.

"I also said if you never did anything because someone in the family had done it first, you were going to—"

"Have a really boring life," James finished. "I'd forgotten about that." He drained the last of his butterbeer and licked the foam from his lips. "So, how did you handle it? Living up to all your brothers and Dad too."

Ron passed his empty shot glass between his hands. "I finally realized I didn't have to do the same things as my brothers—or Harry—to be as good as they were. I stopped worrying about beating them and became proud simply to join them, to be one of the six Weasley boys. And you know your dad. He's always quick to share credit."

James traced a scratch in the table. "What if I'm not as good?"

"What if you're not?"

He shrugged, wanting to hear the answer from his godfather.

"The only thing anyone in this family expects from you is your very best. Why do you think your mum's so upset? She knows you've been going off half-arsed all term. You're right, James—being scared you won't be as good as someone else is a crap reason not to try something. Do what you like and give it your best shot. Everybody else can take a hike."

"That's easy for you to say. You had it made. You didn't even have to take your N.E.W.T.s."

Uncle Ron laughed. "Are you kidding? When I joined the Aurors, everyone thought I was riding on Harry's coattails. They said Hermione was the one smart enough to skip exams, not me. They said I should be working at the Wheezes—that's what Mum and George and Percy wanted. I worked my arse off that first year trying to prove I belonged and help with the shop too. If Hermione hadn't gone back to school, we probably would have broken up anyway. No time for a girlfriend," Ron said, anticipating James's question. "In fact, your dad was so absorbed in work he nearly missed your mum's first professional match. We've all worked for what we have. You'll have to do the same."

"I don't want to be prefect," James blurted.

"Why not? It will look good on your Auror application."

James hesitated. He didn't want to be compared to his dad, but he wanted people to think they were alike all the same. "Dad wasn't."

"Make up your mind, James."

He shrugged, watching the waitress weave through tables with a full tray.

"Look, you want to be an Auror, right? You, James, have decided that of your own free will. Not because your dad is, or because I am, or even because of Teddy, but because that's what _you_ want. Right?"

James met his gaze and nodded.

"You want to be an Auror, and being a prefect can help you. So, why not be a good prefect? That's not being like someone else. That's doing something that will get you what you want. That's being smart."

Ron left some coins on the table. "Come on, let's go."

He led the way out of the pub, and they walked to Honeydukes in companionable silence. James had a lot to think about.

"You going to be okay getting back to the Tower on your own?"

"Yeah. Thanks for the map."

"You're welcome. And James? If you want to annoy your mother without getting in trouble, offer to help her through the portrait hole." Uncle Ron winked and disappeared into the night.


	13. Chapter 13

_Saturday evening_

_the Fat Lady's corridor_

Ginny and Harry bid James a good night and watched him climb through the portrait hole. Harry whipped the Invisibility Cloak out of his pocket.

"Care to go for a walk?"

Ginny stepped into his embrace, and he settled the Cloak over both of them.

"Where's the map?" they asked together.

Harry frowned. "How should I know? McGonagall gave it to you."

"It wasn't in my suitcase. I thought you took it out."

He shook his head. "James?"

"I've barely left him alone long enough to go to the loo, much less sneak into another wing of the castle. Lily, more likely," Ginny said as they began walking. "This would be the perfect opportunity with me being so close to the boys."

"He could have done it when you left."

"Maybe. But I don't want to talk about the kids." She turned so she was walking backwards, a little awkward to do and stay under the Cloak, but she wanted to see Harry's face. "We haven't both been at Hogwarts since you were sixteen. Any teenage fantasies I can fulfill?"

He placed his hands on her waist. "Plenty."

"Pick one." Ginny smiled in invitation. They were barely moving now, dancing more than walking.

"I thought maybe … the changing rooms?"

She grinned and turned, picking up the pace. "I was hoping you would say that."

Harry took her hand as they started down the stairs. "Should I be asking you the same thing?"

"Oh, you've already done a lot of mine."

"Like what?"

"Kissing in the common room, by the lake, on top of the Astronomy Tower—"

"Bor-ing."

"You proposed," she continued. She'd get him for that boring comment later. "You wrote me love letters that I read at breakfast in the Great Hall. I had your baby and took him to Platform Nine and Three-Quarters and sent him to Hogwarts."

"I thought we weren't going to talk about the kids," Harry said, amused.

They were whispering even though they didn't have to, but it felt weird to talk normally under the Cloak. They didn't really need it, of course; it wasn't yet curfew, and even if it were, no one would bat an eye at two adults walking through the castle. But it was more fun this way; reenacting those few perfect weeks in her fifth year when they'd snuck away from Ron as often as possible, the inability to get enough of each other, the sensation they were doing something forbidden when they had been completely familiar with each other for years.

"Fine. Why the changing rooms?" Ginny said.

"Why not the changing rooms?"

"We've done them before."

"Not at Hogwarts."

"That's not an answer."

"I fell in love with you on the Quidditch pitch."

"But you didn't say the pitch," Ginny teased, expecting Harry's quick sideways look at the idea.

"Fine. I've always wanted to see you naked in the showers. Happy now?"

"You have seen me naked in the shower."

Harry pulled her to the side as a group of Ravenclaws walked past.

"Our shower doesn't smell like Quidditch."

"Thank goodness for that." But she knew what he meant; it was his Amortentia smell. Broomstick wood, her shampoo, and treacle tart.

"Maybe I can convince you to ride my broomstick."

"Harry!" Ginny sputtered with laughter. "That's awful."

"You started it." He magicked the front doors open, and they shivered in the night air.

"I—"

He interrupted her with a kiss, a soft, dreamy kiss that spoke of falling in love, and memories, and dreams come true. Ginny opened her eyes slowly and was surprised to see Harry looked frustrated.

"What is it?"

"Damn anti-Apparition wards," he grumbled. "Come on."

Laughing, she took his hand, and they ran across the grounds.

()()()()

_Saturday night_

_Hogwarts Castle_

"Shh, you're going to get us caught," Harry whispered.

"Stop making me laugh!"

"I'm not doing anything."

Ginny mimicked his cautious, tip-toeing posture with exaggerated accuracy, and Harry stifled his own laughter.

"We could ditch the Cloak and walk back to our rooms like adults," he suggested. "We would have been back there already if you hadn't—"

"You're the one who said my fantasies were boring."

"If I say it again, will you do something else?"

Ginny threw one arm across his chest and froze. Harry drew a deep breath and held it. Of all the people he did not want to discover that he was sneaking around Hogwarts like an adolescent, his nephew Louis was at the top of the list. Louis and the prefect he was with crossed the corridor with only a cursory glance in each direction, and once their voices faded away, Harry and Ginny resumed walking.

"We should have come back before curfew," Ginny whispered.

"We should lose the Cloak and stop trying to hide."

"Scaredy cat." She led the way up the stairs to the fifth floor.

Harry focused on not stepping on her robes. "How many of our nieces and nephews are prefects?"

"Not counting Jamie?"

"Well, seeing as he's neither our niece nor—" He grunted as her elbow connected with his midsection.

"Just Louis and Rose now that Molly's left."

Harry risked settling his hands on her hips to keep her close and was rewarded with a smile over her shoulder. But Ginny stepped on the front edge of the Cloak when she looked behind her, pulling Harry forward against her back, and they stumbled into a suit of armor, which fell off its plinth and against the side wall of the alcove with a deafening clatter that echoed down the stone halls.

Ginny swore and rubbed her elbow.

"Are you okay?"

"Who's there?"

Harry had been wrong. The person he least wanted to discover he was sneaking around Hogwarts, albeit with his wife (which now that he thought about it, he wasn't sure was in his favor or not), was his goddaughter, Rose.

And Scorpius Malfoy.

Harry closed his eyes, tightened his arms around Ginny, and backed into the now-spacious alcove. _Go away, go away, just go away._ He knew it was futile. Rose was insatiably curious, just like her mother.

"I don't see anybody," Malfoy said. Harry could tell by the sound of his voice he was walking towards them. "And I didn't hear a door close."

Several doors opened and closed as Rose and Malfoy (Harry grimaced, picturing Ron's reaction at the linking of their names) checked nearby classrooms and cupboards.

"Well, someone was definitely here," Rose said, now directly in front of them as she stared at the leaning suit of armor. "_Erecto._"

Harry turned himself and Ginny sideways as the knight resumed his upright position. Harry could feel Ginny's heart racing against his forearm. They should have forgotten about the Cloak, they should have just walked through the halls like normal. No one would have thought twice about a married couple taking an evening stroll, but if they were caught hiding … by Malfoy….

Rose's forehead wrinkled, and Harry got his wand out just in time.

"_Homenum revelio_," she said.

Nothing happened.

"Nothing?" Scorpius said.

"Oh, Merlin," Rose said, backing away from the alcove.

"What?"

"I bet it's—it's—"

"The Invisibility Cloak!" Scorpius said. "You think James gave his mum the slip?"

"Not James, Aunt Ginny. James had it on when he pranked McGonagall, and she gave it to Aunt Ginny."

"What would your aunt want with an Invisibility Cloak?" Scorpius said blankly.

Rose gave him a meaningful look. Scorpius stared back at her.

"I saw Uncle Harry at dinner."

Scorpius's jaw dropped. "You don't think…."

Rose closed her eyes and nodded.

He frowned. "But the spell—"

Rose's freckled face crinkled, her eyes still screwed shut as if not seeing prevented her from thinking. "Uncle Harry would know how to block that spell."

Harry pressed his lips together. The fear of being caught was quickly being surpassed by amusement at his niece's revulsion.

"We should go," Scorpius said, taking Rose's arm and backing away from the scene. "Let them alone."

Rose whimpered.

"And not say anything about this to anybody," Scorpius added.

"Not anybody," Rose said in a louder-than-normal voice. "Not ever."

Ginny was shaking slightly. Harry raised one hand to cover her mouth, burying his own in her hair.

Rose and Scorpius broke into a run.

Harry pulled the Invisibility Cloak off, and the two of them burst into laughter.

Ginny was nearly crying. "Did you see—"

"Rose's expression," Harry gasped.

"And Scorpius, of all people— Harry, what are you doing? What if—"

"This is the safest place in the castle. They're definitely not coming back here."

()()()()

_Sunday morning_

_the Great Hall_

James and Cameron were already at breakfast when Harry and Ginny entered the Great Hall hand-in-hand.

"Hello, Cameron," Harry said, reaching across the table. "Sorry for not greeting you last night."

Wedged between the bench and the table, Cameron stood awkwardly and returned the handshake. "It's no problem, sir. Good morning, Mrs. Potter."

"Good morning, Cameron, James."

Mouth full, James waved his fork in her direction. The hall darkened with shadows as the owls flew in, one dropping the _Sunday Prophet_ on Harry's plate.

Ginny picked it up. "I want to see how much damage Pearson did to my article about the Wasps. He's a fan. Oh, look. We made the front page, love."

Harry looked alarmed. "Not—"

Ginny showed him the photo and he relaxed. "One of the kids must have taken it and sent it in."

As she opened the paper and turned to the Quidditch section, James saw the front page photo, below the fold, of himself and his parents at dinner last night. His photo-self poked at his vegetables, and his parents talked with their heads close together. Beside him, James was conscious of Cameron watching his parents closely.

"Well?" Harry said, filling his and Ginny's teacups.

"It looks the same," Ginny said, setting down the paper and pouring herself a bowl of cereal. "He printed the 'the opinions in this article belong to the reporter and do not represent the viewpoint of the_ Daily Prophet_' disclaimer again."

"Pardon me," said a tiny Hufflepuff behind James. "Mrs. Potter, would you—" She held out a page of the _Prophet_, folded to Ginny's article.

Ginny pulled out her self-inking quill and signed it, returning it to the girl with a smile.

"Been signing a lot of autographs?" Harry asked.

"A few. The boys say my 2004 Player of the Season poster is enjoying a resurgence."

"Well, yeah, Gin. It's a twenty-year-old photo."

James stopped with a slice of bacon halfway folded into his mouth. Even he knew that was stupid, and he didn't have a girlfriend. His eyes strayed down the table to a certain blonde. Yet.

"Seventeen," Harry said hastily. "That was only seventeen _very short_ years ago. And you're just as beautiful now as you were then. More so, even."

Ginny gave him one long, cold look and dug into her corn flakes.

Good. Let her be mad at somebody else for a change. James reached for a section of the paper.

"Are they … _flirting_?" Cameron murmured several minutes later.

"Probably." James continued reading the weekly crime blotter.

"I—I really think they are," Cameron said incredulously.

James looked up in time to see Harry brush Ginny's hair off her shoulder-she wore it down today-and whisper something in her ear. She swatted him, but her cheeks pinked and he grinned.

"It will be over soon," James said, returning to his section of the paper.

"It's so weird, but so fascinating." Cameron was still staring.

"You really need to get out more, Cam."

He shoved James's shoulder. "Shut it. I've just never seen parents act like that."

"Like what?"

"Like they actually like each other."

"I keep telling you, you should come round my house over summer hols. My whole family is like that. It's disgusting."

It wasn't that bad. Yes, it was … unpleasant … to think about his parents doing—well, what married people did—but knowing they loved each other, that he always had a home to go to, that he didn't have to choose where to spend his holidays or worry about what would happen if both his parents showed up at the same event, that was worth a little unpleasantness.

"Isn't that Ron and Hermione's owl?" Harry said, watching a small owl struggle to control his descent over the table with an apparently heavy box strapped to his legs.

"Bantam, what are you doing all the way up here, hmm?" Ginny stood and caught the animal, setting him down on the table and untying the box. "What is Hermione doing sending you so far away with such a big package?" She filched a piece of bacon off Harry's plate and fed it to the bird.

"It's addressed to you." Harry handed the package to his wife.

Ginny opened the box with her wand, pulled out two letters, and passed one to James.

_Dear James,_

_I am well, thank you for asking. It is generally in poor taste to ask someone for a favor and harass her simultaneously, but since the favor is not for you, I will add Cameron to my list. In keeping with your childish behavior of late (your thoughtfulness towards Cameron a notable exception), I'm including a gift for your mum for Show and Tell. You might want to ask her what happened to the girl who ratted out Dumbledore's Army._

_Love from,_

_Aunt Hermione_

"Aww, look!"

James was appalled to discover the box was full of photos—his baby photos.

"This was right after you were born, Jamie, look." Ginny held up a picture of him in Hermione's arms. He was asleep, and Aunt Hermione was crying.

"Mum, please—"

"And look at this one! Harry, do you remember this?"

"Mum, _please_—"

"May I see, Mrs. Potter?" It was Caitlin. He should have found a way to make up for her having to cover his prefect duties. Twice. She smiled at the photo. "You were a very cute baby, James. Here, Millie, look."

And to his horror, she passed the picture to Millie, and every Gryffindor girl within earshot crowded close. James made a grab for the box and got his hand smacked.

"Come on, mate, let's go," Cameron said in a low voice. "There's no telling what's going to come out of there next."

James didn't take his eyes off the box of photos. "But I should—"

"You should run," Cameron said. "You sent the catnip to your aunt, didn't you? I _told_ you it was a bad idea!"

"Oh, look, Gin. Here's the one your mum took of James nursing."

James ran.

()()()()

"Harry Potter, that is no such thing," Ginny scolded, taking the picture of Ron bent in half holding a wobbly James by the hands and walking him across the Burrow's garden. She passed it to the girls.

Harry picked up a handful of photographs and flipped through them. "Maybe it's in here somewhere. I love that photo."

Ginny snorted, sifting through her own stack. "You love that photo because I'm half naked."

"I love that photo because you look peaceful and happy as well as beautiful. Here, see?"

James was maybe four months old, a tiny hand resting on the curve of her breast as he suckled. Ginny wore an old button-down shirt of Harry's and had taken half of it off, leaving her arm, shoulder, and chest exposed. She cradled James, one arm along the length of his back and her other hand cupping his head as she bent her own to talk to her firstborn. Ginny touched the baby in the photo and smiled, remembering. She had been happy.

"Come on, you can look at these later." Harry accepted the photos from CeCe and reached for Ginny's stack, adding them to the box and banishing it to her guest quarters.

"Wonder what he did to upset Hermione?" Ginny said as they left the Great Hall.

"Could be anything. Where do you think he went?"

"We can find out easily enough." Ginny took out her wand.

"Ginny!"

"What?"

"You put a monitoring charm on a sixteen-year-old?"

"It's only illegal if they're an adult and he's not," she said defensively.

Harry raised one eyebrow. "You really have been a pain, haven't you?"

"He's almost a foot taller than I am, and the first few days he was always taking the stairs two or three at a time. I couldn't keep up. I forgot about the map at first, and this works better, anyway."

"Go on, then."

"Outside," she reported.

"I'll catch you up. I want to say goodbye to Al and Lily first."


	14. Chapter 14

A/N: Thanks to _MandyinKC_ and _speedsONEandONLY_ for two details that appear in this chapter :D

* * *

()()()()

_Sunday afternoon_

_the Hogwarts grounds_

Ginny sat on a blanket on the grassy lawn near the lake, surrounded by pupils enjoying the beautiful Indian summer weather. The air had the slightest bite, but she was comfortable in her jumper in the sunshine, and the clear sky was rare enough not to be missed. In deference to McGonagall's wishes, Harry had said goodbye to the children and left shortly after breakfast. James and most of the sixth-year Gryffindors were nearby. Al and Scorpius Malfoy were on the big rocks near the shore, trying to coax the Giant Squid into the shallows. Rose and Lucy had joined Ginny about half an hour ago, each with her own book, and when Lily and Roxie ran up, Rose enlarged the blanket. Lily and Roxie were inseparable at home, and Ginny was glad to see the friendship continue at Hogwarts despite their separate houses. The younger girls began practicing color-changing charms on everything in sight, with Rose's book and Ginny's notes quickly being declared off-limits.

This was one of the unexpected benefits of being at Hogwarts: watching the children use magic. Because of the Reasonable Restriction of Underage Sorcery and Harry's unreasonable enforcement of it, the only magic Ginny had seen her children perform was accidental magic when they were small. This was much better. Lily really had a knack for Transfiguration, and despite his recent struggles, James was developing the intuitive, personal style of fully-qualified wizards. Ginny kept her head down and her mouth shut, pretending to be absorbed in her writing, and soon the girls chatted freely, providing a wealth of insights and gossip that would never have been included in letters home.

The air cooled as the afternoon wore on. Used to the milder weather of southern England, Ginny had forgotten her schoolgirl habit of always keeping a scarf with her. She had just started to wonder when James would want to go in for dinner when a capricious wind blew her notes across the lawn. She jumped up and grabbed the parchments that were in reach as Rose and Lucy summoned the rest. Accepting the disordered stack, Ginny sat down with a slight shiver.

"Are you cold, Mum? You can borrow my scarf," Lily said.

"No, that's okay, thanks." Ginny couldn't help giving the green and silver scarf coiled in the middle of the blanket a wary glance. "It's just the wind."

But short minutes later the capricious wind had settled into a steady breeze, and as clouds scuttled across the sky, Ginny pulled the sleeves of her jumper down over her hands. Pupils all across the grounds gathered belongings and walked back to the castle … except her children, of course. Al and Scorpius had joined James and his friends for what looked like a football free-for-all, and the girls simply moved closer together and turned their backs to the wind. But Ginny was the type of person who, once she was cold, could not get warm again without tea and a fire, and her discomfort became more obvious despite her attempts to suppress the shivering.

"Aunt Ginny, you really should take Lily's scarf," Rose said, not looking up from her book.

"Merlin, Mum, you look like you're freezing."

"I'm fine." Ginny smiled and tucked her elbows closer to her body. "It's almost dinnertime, anyway."

Roxie, with a nice, thick, scarlet-and-gold Gryffindor scarf wrapped around her neck, looked over at the boys. "They don't look like they'll be going in soon."

"Seriously, just take it." Lily held out her scarf.

Ginny flinched away from it, and her daughter and nieces laughed.

"Come on, it won't bite you," Lily teased, waving the green-and-silver fringe playfully in her mother's face. "Or are you chicken?"

Ginny straightened up. "Of course not. But Gryffindors do not wear Slytherin accessories. Even first-years know that." She mimicked Lily's condescending tone from Friday, when Ginny had teased her about entering the Slytherin common room.

Lily's eyes sparkled.

"And don't you dare—"

But the chicken noise came from Rose, not Lily. Ginny stared at her goddaughter, so surprised she forgot to be offended, and saw her brothers in the smiling, freckled face laughing up at her.

"Give me that."

()()()()

_Sunday evening_

_the Entrance Hall_

They passed McGonagall leaving the Great Hall as they approached for dinner. Ginny tried to hide behind James, but the Headmistress had already spotted her.

"Ginny Weasley Potter!" Her voice rang through the hall, drawing everyone's attention. "What is that—that _thing_—" McGonagall's nostrils flared, and Ginny was sure she had nearly said _abomination_— "around your neck?"

"It's a scarf, Professor."

"I can see that, Mrs. Potter," McGonagall said, her voice considerably quieter but no less sharp. "What I do not know is why one of my best Gryffindors is wearing Slytherin colors."

"They dared me, Professor. Rose bokked at me."

"R—Miss Weasley?"

"Yes, Professor. So you see, I really had no choice," Ginny said with dignity. "Gryffindor honor was at stake."

"Yes, I quite agree," McGonagall said in her normal voice, her eyes lingering on the scarf before looking Ginny in the face. "I'm sure Mr. Potter appreciates the gesture."

Ginny fought hard to keep her face straight as McGonagall turned and swept up the marble staircase.

"You're the worst sister ever," James said under his breath to Lily. "You're such a Slytherin."

"Thank you," Lily said brightly.

"It wasn't a compliment."

"Just because I can get Mum to do whatever I want and you're still—"

"Enough, you two." Ginny watched her daughter flounce off to join her friends at the Slytherin table, then turned to James and Al. "Do either of you have any itching powder?"

()()()()

_Sunday night_

_the fifth floor_

Ginny trailed listlessly behind James and Brad Derrick. If she had thought prefect meetings were boring, patrol duty was not much better. At least they were moving, even if there was an uneasy silence between the two boys. James had spent several minutes during this evening's prefect meeting adjusting schedules so he could cover for the prefects who had been forced to take on his duties over the last ten days. Between night patrol and supervising the younger pupils during breaks, there were quite a few people to repay. Tonight's patrol belonged to the sixth-year Slytherins, but James was covering for the girl tonight. Ginny was pleased that he was initiating some responsibility, but if it meant spending the next three nights wandering aimlessly about the castle (tomorrow for James's regular patrol, Tuesday for Louis, and Wednesday for Caitlin), she would call an evening Harpies' practice herself.

They approached a crossing corridor, and Ginny recognized the turn to the East Wing and the Portable Swamp. Perhaps sensing his mother's discomfort, James finally spoke.

"What do you think about Quidditch practice tomorrow?"

James was going to be very busy, attending Quidditch practice for two teams and taking on extra prefect duties. Maybe even busy enough to keep him out of trouble. Remembering his disappointment when she had bailed on practice last week, Ginny quickened her step to walk beside the boys and waited for an opportunity to join the conversation.

"What do you think, Mum? I know you haven't seen the Slytherins fly, but…."

"Actually, it's only Miles I've never seen fly," Ginny said. "But Lily didn't tell me who's on the Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw team—any new players?"

"Several," Brad said, opening a door at random, then closing it again. "They usually have very different flying styles, and I have no idea what that's going to look like when they play together."

"Why not observe some practices?" Ginny suggested. "Between the two of you, you should be able to catch both their solo and combined teams."

Brad looked at James. "That okay with you? You've got a lot on your plate."

"No more than you."

"I'm not the one picking up extra patrols, and I'm not taking as many lessons as you are, either."

"How do you know that?"

Brad shrugged. "Everyone knows you're studying for an Auror or maybe a curse-breaker. You continued Arithmancy this year."

"Or a Healer," James retorted. He didn't seem to like the idea of "everyone" knowing what he was studying.

"Nah. No bedside manner."

James's mouth twitched, and he led the way around the next corner.

"How long do we have to stay out here?" Ginny said, opening the first door she came to. Might as well get into the spirit of the thing.

"You weren't a prefect?" Bradley said.

She shook her head. "Most of my brothers were, but not I."

"The way everybody talks, I thought…."

"You shouldn't believe everything you hear."

"You were in Dumbledore's Army, though?"

"Yes." She slipped one hand behind a tapestry and pulled it away from the wall.

"And you have an Order of Merlin?"

"Somewhere."

"Oh, Aunt Hermione said I should ask you what happened to the girl who ratted out the DA."

Ginny followed the boys up the stairs, using the handrail for support as her back protested the movement. She reached her free hand back to massage the sore spot. It had been bothering her on and off all day, but it wasn't like she had done anything this weekend other than follow James and Harry—oh.

She reached the landing several steps behind the boys, who looked at her expectantly. Ginny forced her thoughts away from last night and back to the conversation at hand.

"When the DA was formed, Hermione had everyone sign a piece of parchment as an agreement to keep the meetings secret. What we didn't know until Marietta snitched was that Hermione had jinxed it."

"What happened?" James said, using his wand to shine light into an alcove.

"The word _sneak_ spelled out across her face in dark purple pustules. No one, not Umbridge or Madame Pomfrey or even Professor Flitwick, the Charms professor, could figure out how to remove them. They were still there at the beginning of the next school year."

Both boys gaped.

"Aunt Hermione did that?" James looked a little nervous.

Ginny smiled. "Hermione is serious about keeping promises. You've heard her say that before. And this was very serious indeed. The Ministry controlled Hogwarts that year, remember, and did not believe what Dumbledore and Harry said about Voldemort's return. We all would have been expelled, about thirty of us, and our parents who worked in the Ministry could have been fired. Harry would have been sent to Azkaban. Umbridge tried at the beginning of the year, before school even started."

"The Dementor attack," James said.

"Dementors? Didn't they used to guard Azkaban?"

James launched into a description of the creatures, complete with details of the Patronus Charm and Harry's trial. Brad seemed genuinely curious (Ginny supposed he'd never heard anything about Harry in any detail), and James didn't seem to mind his interest. She pondered this observation as the boys walked the sixth and seventh floors, continuing to peer into classrooms and peek behind tapestries. It was crowds that James didn't like: the group of pupils asking for her autograph outside the DADA classroom; the stares from everyone in the courtyard or the Great Hall; the parliament of owls that appeared at their kitchen window for days after his O.W.L. results were published. He was so like Harry.

Speaking of whom…. Ginny stared at the familiar head of messy black hair in the cupboard she had just opened. But it couldn't be Harry; he had left Hogwarts this morning. And Harry wouldn't be snogging someone else...

"_Albus_?"

There was a wet sound, a feminine gasp, and Ginny found herself staring into the emerald-green eyes of her younger son, illuminated by the candles charmed to float overhead.

"Hi, Mum," Al said weakly.

She was definitely calling an evening Harpies practice tomorrow.

()()()()

"What the hell?" Al said to James under his breath.

The boys walked back to Gryffindor Tower ahead of Ginny and Maggie after a snickering Derrick left for the Slytherin dungeons.

"I'm sorry," James said, unable to keep his own laughter out of his voice. "I forgot to tell you."

"You weren't supposed to be on duty tonight," Al hissed, sending a nervous glance over his shoulder, where his mother and his girlfriend walked side-by-side in stiff silence.

"I switched with Greengrass-Rhodes. You know, because she had to take an extra duty for me. I'm on patrol tomorrow, Tuesday, and Wednesday too."

"Bloody hell," Al muttered. "Four days?"

"I owe a lot of people. What's with the candles, anyway? Broom cupboards aren't very romantic, even with candlelight."

Al smirked. "Says the boy who's never been in one."

"Shut it." James shoved his brother's shoulder.

Ginny cleared her throat, and both boys straightened up immediately.

"Sorry, Mum."

"Sorry, Mum."

"Well, she knows now," James said in a low voice.

"And it's your fault," Al said sourly. "I could have kept the secret."

"It could have been worse. At least you both had all your clothes on."

"It's not like that," Al said, sounding angry for the first time. "You don't know what you're talking about."

They had reached the Fat Lady's portrait. Maggie walked past Al, gave the password, and climbed through the portrait hole without so much as looking at him. Al followed, looking miserable.

"Here, Mum, let me help." James held the portrait open with one hand and extended the other to his mother. She looked down her nose at it.

"What do you know about her?"

"Maggie? She's all right. She's in Al's year. You should ask CeCe. They're best friends."

Ginny pursed her lips. "Maybe I will." She still made no move to enter the common room.

"Mum? Are you coming?"

She looked at James as if just now seeing him. "Not tonight. I'll see you in the morning, all right?"

As James climbed through the portrait hole and joined his friends, he couldn't help thinking the weekend had turned out okay after all.


	15. Chapter 15

_Monday afternoon_

_Gryffindor Common Room_

James flipped to the index of _Advanced Potion-Making_ and rubbed his forehead, trying to dispel the headache growing there. He had his homework done for his next lesson, Herbology, but Fawley, Goldstein, and Viridian had all assigned a combination of extra reading, spell practice, and essays this morning, and he had two worksheets of Arithmancy calculations due tomorrow afternoon as well as an essay to finish for Transfiguration in the morning. And he had both Quidditch practice _and_ prefect duty tonight. And tomorrow. And the night after that.

He sighed and returned to his notes, trying to remember what he was looking for. Mandrakes, that was it. Professor Fawley had them studying healing potions, specifically the concentration at which different ingredients morphed from ineffective to therapeutic to toxic. It was interesting but complex, and James couldn't stay focused. He kept thinking about the advice Cameron had given him last week: _"Seems to me the fastest way to get her out of here is to do what she wants." _

James glanced at his mother, sitting across the table from him and writing steadily. Uncle Ron had been right about helping her through the portrait hole as a way to annoy her. When James had offered his hand after lunch, she had given first his hand, then him a dirty look before swinging through on her own. Maybe Uncle Ron was right about the other stuff too, about earning his own way and not listening to other people's opinions and making the choices that would get him where he wanted to go.

James watched his mother write for a few minutes. Was this what she chose? Writing about Quidditch, instead of playing it? She had quit the Harpies at the height of her career, and despite a respectable collection of N.E.W.T.s, had not sought a position as a Healer or an Auror or with the Ministry or even as a teacher. Was she happy being a mum? Even now, with him being … difficult? She certainly didn't care what people thought of her being at Hogwarts. She had decided it was the best way to handle the situation and she did it.

Could he do that? Do the work for his lessons, learn leadership skills as Quidditch Captain and prefect, and ignore the opinions of others to accomplish his goals? Teddy had. There had been a lot of interest when Nymphadora Tonks's son and Harry Potter's godson joined the Aurors. Teddy had taken it in stride, working hard in the Academy and completing his requirements just like everyone else. James remembered the last week of summer, when he had gone with Teddy to visit his grandmother. Mrs. Tonks had fussed over both of them, and James had asked Teddy about it later, after they left. _"Doesn't it bother you that she still fusses over you like you're a little kid?" "It used to," Teddy said. "Until I realized she does it not because she thinks I need it, but because she does."_

James hadn't understood what Teddy meant at the time, but he thought maybe he did now. He had always thought of his mum as invincible, constant, that his petty misbehavior and unkind words just rolled off her since she always loved him, always forgave him. But if he had learned anything in the last ten days, it was that his mother was human, just like he was. She made mistakes and could feel hurt and angry and sad and scared. In fact, he had seen her display all those emotions since she came to Hogwarts.

James realized his quill was dripping ink in a large splotch and put it back in the inkwell. Maybe he would do what his mum wanted. Uncle Ron was right; if James wanted to be an Auror, it was smart to do the things that would help him accomplish his goal. He had earned his captaincy, and his prefect badge, and his O.W.L.s. His parents hadn't helped him any more than any interested mum or dad would. He was likely to be judged anyway, so he might as well make the comparison favorable.

Now, if he could just shake Ginny long enough to make plans for the trip to Hogsmeade this weekend….

()()()()

_Tuesday afternoon_

_the Arithmancy classroom_

Ginny sat beside James, watching him take notes as her mind swirled with numbers. She couldn't remember the last time she had been so confused, but James nodded every few minutes as if Professor Vector's words actually made sense. Ginny would have loved to write to Harry, but if she got caught in this lesson, there was no way she could magic herself out of it. She didn't even know this was magic—it could be Gobbledegook for all she understood.

Someone knocked on the door. Quills paused and necks craned as everyone tried to see who had interrupted.

"Mrs. Potter, your presence is requested," Professor Vector said.

Ginny turned to James, who shrugged. She left the classroom to find the Slytherin prefect James had covered for on Sunday night waiting in the hallway. She was tall and blonde and reminded Ginny oddly of Fleur.

"It's Lily," the girl said. "She's sick."

Ginny quickened her step. "What's wrong?"

"I think it might be … you know."

Ginny stared at her. No, she didn't know, which was why she was following this stranger with her perfectly draped robes and posh accent.

"She's locked herself in the lavatory, and she won't come out," the girl said, giving Ginny a significant look. "I think it might be…." Another delicate pause.

"Ah," Ginny said, taking a full breath again as thoughts of potion poisonings, artifact accidents, and charm catastrophes receded to the back corners of her mind. They walked down a flight of stairs.

"I tried to talk to her about it, but she told me to go away. She was crying, so I thought I'd come get you."

"Thank you—er, I'm sorry, I don't know your name."

"Charlotte Greengrass-Rhodes."

"Ginny Weasley Potter," she answered, automatically introducing herself by both her maiden and married names as was common among magic-born witches. The wizarding world was a small community, and this helped people make connections.

"Yes, I know."

Ginny realized why Charlotte reminded her of Fleur. It wasn't her beauty, although she was attractive. It wasn't even her platinum blonde hair. It was that intimidating projection of confidence.

Scorpius was an only child, so…. "You're Daphne's daughter?"

"Yes."

They stopped in front of a lavatory. The door was open, but no crying could be heard.

"Thank you, Charlotte. It was thoughtful to come for me."

"Slytherins take care of their own," Charlotte said somewhat cooly.

"So Lily tells me." Ginny smiled. Charlotte didn't.

"Lily? It's Mum. Are you in here, love?"

"Mum?" Lily's tearful voice came from the far cubicle.

Ginny walked towards it. "Yes, it's me. What's the matter?"

Lily unlocked the door and flung herself into Ginny's arms. "Istartedmyperiod," Lily said in a rush.

"Okay," Ginny said calmly, stroking Lily's hair. "Do you have anything with you?" Ginny had given her a few pads to carry in her school bag just in case.

Lily nodded, face still buried in her mother's chest. "But—but I—"

"Need clean knickers?"

Lily nodded again.

"I'll walk you to your common room and you can change."

Lily sniffed, her arms still around Ginny's waist. "Can't you get me some?"

Ginny tugged on her braid. "Gryffindors aren't allowed in the Slytherin common room, remember?"

Lily raised her face. "Can't you conjure me a pair? I can't—" Her pink face turned crimson. "I can't be seen like this."

"Your robes are fine," Ginny said soothingly, turning her to make sure, but Lily shook her head frantically.

"I'm not leaving here until I have new knickers. Everyone will know!"

"No one is going to know," Ginny and Charlotte said together.

Ginny turned around in surprise. She thought the older girl had left.

Lily crossed her arms over her chest and set her jaw. Recognizing the look, Ginny conjured a pair of plain white knickers.

Lily took them without a word and shut herself in the cubicle again.

"What am I going to do for pads?" she said. "All I have is what you gave me last summer."

"I'll write to—"

"NO!" Lily shrieked, and a loud thump came from the other side, as if she had tried to get through the door without opening it first. "You can't tell Dad!"

"I'm not due for another two weeks," Charlotte said. "You can have mine and then pick some up in Hogsmeade this weekend to pay me back."

Lily remembered to open the door this time. "I can't buy pads in Hogsmeade," she whispered, now so pale her freckles stood out in sharp relief. "Everyone will know!"

"Unless you let your mum send you some from home, that's your only choice," Charlotte said reasonably. "Madame Branstone keeps a whole cabinet full of them, but she won't supply you all year."

"I'll say they're for me," Ginny said. "That will get you through this week, and then when I get home, I'll send enough for the rest of term. Okay?"

"You won't tell Dad I started? Or James or Al, either? Or—"

"I won't tell any of the boys," Ginny said before Lily could run down the list of her male cousins. "It will be fine, Lils. There's nothing to be embarrassed about—it's a normal part of growing up."

Lily looked highly skeptical.

"Come on," Charlotte said. "We'll go get them now, while everyone's still in lessons. You can say you went to the hospital wing and Madame Branstone gave you a potion." She smiled at Lily.

"I'll check in with you later, okay?" Ginny said, hugging Lily again.

But Ginny didn't follow. She stared at the door Lily and Charlotte had left through, lost in thought. When Lily celebrated her thirteenth birthday and returned to school without starting her period, Ginny had resigned herself to not being able to share this milestone with her daughter. Yet here they were, together not because Lily was home, but because Ginny was at Hogwarts.

And she had James to thank for it.

()()()()

_Tuesday afternoon_

_the Arithmancy corridor_

James stood at the balcony between staircases, oblivious to the bumping and jostling of his fellow pupils as everyone streamed away from the classrooms in an end-of-day rush. Ginny had not returned to class before the lesson ended and would be expecting to meet him in the Great Hall, which meant downstairs. But Ce—_she_ would be upstairs in the common room since she always dropped her books off before heading to dinner, and he wanted to ask her something. James bit the inside of his lip, looking from one staircase to the other. Maybe if he hurried, he could get to the common room first, catch her before she met up with her friends, and walk her to the Great Hall. Ginny didn't need to know he hadn't come straight from lessons.

James had just turned towards the ascending stairs when someone called his name.

"Potter, wait up!"

It was Derrick. James blew out a breath and waited while the Slytherin captain cut his way across the tide of pupils curving downstairs en mass. He'd never catch up now.

"Listen, I just found out," Derrick said breathlessly. "The Hufflepuffs have practice today. Now, in fact—four o'clock. Can you make it? I have to finish Fawley's essay before dinner because my Astronomy group is meeting tonight."

James gave the rising stairs a longing look before turning his back on them. "All right. But you're taking Ravenclaw's. Otherwise, I'll never catch up."

Derrick had merged with the crowd as soon as James agreed, but he saw a hand wave in acknowledgement above the others' heads.

()()()()

_Tuesday, late afternoon_

_the Quidditch pitch_

James and Ginny leaned against the railing, watching the Hufflepuffs flying warm-up laps.

"Do you miss it?" he said.

"Playing Quidditch? Yes. Do I regret leaving? No."

"Why did you quit?" He squinted into the late afternoon sun, studying the Chasers above them, hoping she would give him a real answer, not the pat answers he'd seen printed in the _Prophet_'s archives_._

"I wanted you," Ginny said simply.

James looked up. She had never said that before. At least, not so directly. "But you were young, only twenty-three. And really good. You could have played for another decade, at least."

"Maybe. That's what the critics said. But I knew I wanted more than one child, I knew I didn't want to have them back-to-back, and I knew I didn't want to have babies into my thirties. And—" She hesitated, glancing at him out of the corner of her eye. "And I was deeply in love with your dad, and I wanted to give him a family."

He made a face but said nothing about Harry. "You couldn't have known you'd have me, though. Me, James. I could have been awful."

She smiled. "Some days you were. Some days, especially when Al was born so soon after you despite our plans, I just wanted to chuck the two of you in your cots and fly until I ran out of atmosphere. But then one of you would laugh, or reach for me, or your eyes would light up at something ordinary—an owl flying through the window, or the way rain splattered off the gutter at the side of the house—and I knew I was exactly where I wanted to be, doing exactly what I was meant to do. I always wanted to be a mother, James, and you and Al and Lily are the joy of my life. Quidditch was fun, but I wanted more."

James felt the prick of guilt. He certainly hadn't been the joy of her life lately.

"But you were really good," he repeated. "Rookie of the Year for the whole League, Harpies' Player of the Season … there was even talk about you playing for England again, contending for the next World Cup, and you just quit. No injuries, no disagreements with management, just an announcement of your retirement."

Ginny turned to face him. "How do you know all this? You've never seemed interested in my career before."

James said nothing for a moment, noting this was the fifth time he'd seen Murphy pass the Quaffle instead of making a goal himself. "When we stopped off at the_ Prophet_ on the way home from school last year, one of the blokes said he'd seen the last Gryffindor match and I played Chaser almost as well as my mum. I wanted to know exactly how good that was."

"Oh, James…."

James saw her reach for him, but he kept his shoulders tense, his jaw set, and she let her hand drop.

"You really wanted me more than a World Cup?" The idea was … incredulous. Extraordinary. Empowering.

"More than a thousand World Cups. More than all the awards and accolades in the world." Busy looking anywhere else, James was startled when his mother wrapped her arms around him, pulled him down to her, and ruffled his hair. "Fame and fans are fickle, here today and gone tomorrow, but mothers are forever and ever and ever!"

"Mum! Mum, geroff!"

Sometimes you could really tell that Ginny was the only girl in a family of boys. James squirmed and twisted but she held firm, pinning one arm behind his back and kissing him anywhere she could reach until they were both breathless and laughing.

James straightened up and glanced around. He smoothed his robes before leaning back against the railing in a casual pose, but no one was in sight other than the specks of Hufflepuffs high in the sky. There was something else … and since she had answered his Quidditch question honestly….

"Do you still love Dad?"

"What? Of course I do! Whatever makes you ask that?"

He shrugged. "You said—just a minute ago, you said you _were _deeply in love with him, and—"

"Well, I admit the burning desire to have his baby has faded a bit with the decades," Ginny said dryly.

"And—" James plunged on despite the color in his cheeks— "and you fought a lot this summer."

"Mmm." Ginny stared over the Quidditch pitch, green and pristine in the early pre-season.

James had the distinct impression she was censoring her words.

"We couldn't agree on what to do about you."

"Why not?"

"Your dad thought we were giving you too much freedom, that we should scale it back since you weren't being very responsible. I, on the other hand, thought something was bothering you and knew you'd never tell us if we didn't give you some space. You're like him in that regard, even though he can't see it."

James turned and faced the pitch again but stood close enough that she could touch him if she wanted.

"Is that what was bothering you? Why I stopped playing Quidditch?"

He shrugged one shoulder. "Some."

"Do you want to play professionally after Hogwarts? I thought you wanted to be an Auror."

"Maybe."

Ginny bumped his shoulder. "Maybe Quidditch, or maybe the Academy?"

"Yes."

She reached out and brushed his hair back. The sun had sunk behind the stands, and it was hard to read her expression. "Your dad would be proud of you either way. Uncle Ron too."

"And you?" Over the last two weeks, he had realized he did care what his mother thought about him. Rather a lot, in fact.

She sighed. "Speaking as your mother, Jamie, I would prefer you choose a profession that did not put your life at risk on a daily basis."

"Quidditch it is, then." He grinned at her confusion. "Come on, Mum, the Quidditch season is only from November through May. That's five whole months with no danger at all!"

()()()()

_Thursday morning_

_Hogwarts Castle_

"This way," Ginny said, leading James away from Gryffindor Tower. "I want to show you something."

She had done this several times since the day she showed him the entrance to the Chamber of Secrets. He had seen the spot where Dumbledore had fallen, heard her memory of spending the night in the Great Hall when Sirius broke into the school on Halloween, visited the thestral herd (which he couldn't see, but Ginny could) and by following her instructions, found the dormitory where his grandfather James had carved his and his grandmother's initials into the post of his bed.

Curious as to what she would show him this time, James turned and followed her to the entrance to the Astronomy Tower. Ginny paused, looked around, walked from one side of the hallway to another, then stopped.

"They've changed the pictures, but I think this is where your uncle Bill was attacked by Greyback on the night Dumbledore was killed."

"Where were you?" James said quietly.

She moved several feet away. "About here. Dodging spells from a Death Eater who would become my Defense Against the Dark Arts professor."

"Dad wasn't here, though, was he? He and Dumbledore were—" James remembered what his mother had told him in Moaning Myrtle's bathroom and the way his dad always described what he, Uncle Ron, and Aunt Hermione had done the last year of the war: _we searched for what we needed to destroy Voldemort_. "Were they looking for a Horcrux?"

"Yes. It was well-guarded, and one of the protections was a poisonous potion. Dumbledore drank it and was weak when they returned to Hogwarts."

James walked down the hallway, trying to imagine his mother at—his forehead wrinkled. "How old were you?"

"Fifteen."

Merlin. That was younger than he was now. His mother, as a fifteen-year-old girl, had stood in this hallway and fought fully qualified wizards—wizards practicing dark magic!—while her oldest brother lay injured and bleeding on the ground behind her. James couldn't imagine it. Couldn't imagine dark magic in Hogwarts, couldn't imagine continuing to fight while Al or Lily was hurt.

"I thought—" She took a deep breath. "I was so scared he was dead. Then we didn't know what effect it would have, being bitten by a werewolf that wasn't transformed…."

James stared. Uncle Bill had always had scars, but James had never thought of him as anything other than friendly and easy-going, with the coolest collection of magical artifacts. But that night—everyone must have wondered.

Ginny gave a shaky laugh. "That was the night we finally accepted Fleur into the family. We—well, Mum and I, at least—didn't like her very much at first."

"What happened?"

"She stood up for Bill," Ginny said simply. "They were engaged, but Mum thought she would want to cancel the wedding. Fleur said the scars just proved he was brave, and that she was good-looking enough for both of them."

James grinned. "That sounds like Aunt Fleur."

"Yes, doesn't it?" Ginny said dryly.

"What happened with the Horcrux? Did Dad destroy it?"

"It was a fake," Ginny said. "Your dad was so upset. Dumbledore dead, Snape and Malfoy escaped, Hagrid's hut burned down, Bill injured—all for a fake Horcrux. We all thought we had failed. We didn't understand that Dumbledore had planned his death with Professor Snape."

James knew that story; Harry had made sure they all knew the truth about Snape, both good and bad. "Do you know where Uncle Fred died?"

"Yes."

He hesitated, then asked, "Will you show me?"

Ginny looked at him for a moment, then began walking.

They navigated the castle in silence, climbing stairs and turning corners until Ginny stopped in a corridor on the seventh floor. James passed this spot almost every day as he walked from Gryffindor Tower to other parts of the castle.

"Somewhere here. There was a curse from outside, the wall exploded, and Fred was thrown."

"Why did you do it?"

"What?" Ginny looked at James as if only just seeing him.

"Why did you fight? You were just a kid."

For some reason, Mum stared at a blank stretch of wall halfway down the corridor, across from an old tapestry. "Because it was the right thing to do. Because your dad saved my life when he was only twelve years old and I owed him. Because I loved him. Because Ron followed Harry into everything, and I wanted to help them. Because Bill was scarred, and George lost an ear, and Hermione—brilliant, gifted Hermione—was considered worthless. Because they killed my brother. Because the only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good people to do nothing." Her eyes shone.

"I'm sorry," James said immediately, putting one arm around her. "I didn't mean to make you sad."

"It's all right," she said, blinking the tears away with a smile. "It's just hard to remember sometimes. But this—" She reached up and laid one hand on each side of James's face. "This is what we fought for. That the children who came after us would be able to attend Hogwarts and learn in peace. _All _the magical children. For Muggles to be respected and unharmed by wizards. To see the Houses now, the way you mix together and socialize, it's good. We made too many assumptions that were never corrected because we didn't get to know one another. Every House has strengths and weaknesses. Every person has the ability to make good choices, regardless of where they're Sorted."

James looked down at his mother and saw not just the mum who loved him and nagged him and taught him, but the girl … the sister … the friend … the woman who was brave and spirited and compassionate and determined. He hugged her, squeezing tightly as a swell of pride filled him. Ginny Weasley Potter deserved her reputation as a powerful witch and heroine, and she was _his_ mother.

* * *

a/n: Whew! I won't bore you with the details of my RL, but suffice to say I have been _very_ busy over the last ten days. Thanks for your patience :D We'll wrap up this story with an epilogue, which I will do my best to get to you in a week's time, but no promises. For those of you who wondered, Ginny did not prank her daughter. Ginny's explanation of why she fought in the war is, of course, a quote from Edmund Burke that I modified to gender-neutral language.


	16. Epilogue

_Nine days later_

_the Quidditch stands_

"You look ridiculous," George said in disgust.

Ginny beamed at him. Nothing could dampen her enthusiasm for the inter-house Quidditch match, not the gray skies, not the cold weather, and especially not her most annoying brother. She wore black robes, one green-and-silver-striped glove, one scarlet-and-gold-striped glove, a Gryffindor hat, and Lily's Slytherin scarf. The rest of Ginny's family gathered in the front two rows behind the Gryffindor/Slytherin goalposts wore the colors of their individual houses, but although Harry had a Gryffindor scarf wrapped like a muffler against the biting wind, Ginny had talked him into wearing his bottle-green robes. Not many spectators would notice them under his winter cloak, but Lily would, and that was all that mattered.

Ginny climbed over Audrey and Angelina and sat down beside Hermione, drawing her legs back so Harry could pass in front of her to squeeze next to Ron. Ginny twisted to speak to Victoire, who sat on the row behind with Bill and Fleur.

"Where's Teddy?"

"Ask your husband," Victoire said, and what little of her face that was visible between the scarlet edge of her toque and the gold band of her folded-over scarf scowled.

Ginny gave her a sympathetic smile but said nothing. Victoire had yet to learn how to take the unpredictability of being an Auror's wife with good grace.

"Ginny, dear, I thought you were working," her mother called. She had her knitting in her lap with Molly on one side and Dominique on the other and looked delighted at the prospect of an afternoon spent outside under gray skies since it involved family.

"I am," Ginny said, brushing blue-and-bronze fringe out of her face as Rose moved to speak to her mother. "I'm going to use Harry's Pensieve later. I wanted to be able to enjoy the match." She bounced a little in her seat as she said it, and her mother smiled indulgently at her.

In an effort not to draw too much attention to their children, Harry and Ginny usually attended only one or two of Hogwarts's Quidditch matches throughout the year. Mindful of the intense competition for the Quidditch and House Cups and the fact that a victory for her boys was a loss for her daughter, Ginny had always tempered her cheering for Gryffindor so Lily didn't feel as if her mother were rooting against her. But today … today Ginny got to cheer for her daughter _and _her house, and her Ravenclaw nieces were just going to have to suck it up.

()()()()

_Three hours earlier_

_the Gryffindor boys' sixth-year dormitory_

James grabbed the first jumper his hand touched—last year's Christmas one, a red tweed—and began pulling it on. "I hope Mum's not _too_ embarrassing today," he said.

Cameron stopped with elbows askew, both arms in their sleeves and neck opening poised under his chin. "Are you serious?"

"You know, with me and Lily playing together. It's bad enough at a regular match, but—"

Cameron reached out and pinched him.

"Ouch! What was that for?"

"Stop dreaming," Cameron said, his face reappearing through the turtleneck as he pulled the shirt down and tucked it into his trousers. "Your mum made a prat of herself on a daily basis for no reason at all less than a fortnight ago. Of course she's going to be embarrassing today. Mortifying, probably. Possibly even humiliating. Best you can hope for is that no one gets a photograph of whatever it is she does."

James groaned. "Maybe Dad—"

Cameron shook his head. "Lily's playing too. You always say she's his favorite."

"It's just 'cause she looks like Mum," James grumbled, bending over to pull on a pair of wool socks. It was dark outside, darker than it should be for this time of morning. There was no rain or snow against the windowpanes, but without the warmth of the sun, it would feel that much colder.

"Cheer up, mate. Gryffindor and Slytherin are the two best teams in the school. We're going to crush them, and no one will even remember, much less care, that Carmichael is leading the entire year in everything."

James brightened. DADA, which was usually his favorite lesson, had been ruined yesterday by the bragging of Daisy Carmichael, fellow sixth-year and prefect. The Ravenclaw had gone on and on during dueling practice about her top marks in not only DADA, but Charms, Arithmancy, Herbology, and Transfiguration. When she finally tired of that subject (much later than everyone else in the vicinity), she had moved on to the stellar Keeper skills of her boyfriend and informed James he had no hopes of winning the match when he wouldn't be able to score.

James was quite looking forward to proving her wrong. And as long as his mother's name didn't appear anywhere in the _Prophet _other than her byline, he'd call that a win-win.

()()()()

_Fifty-three minutes into the match_

Ginny leaned over Hermione to speak to Angelina. "Is it just me, or is she really good?"

Lily had just swerved to dodge a Bludger, rolled out of the way of an oncoming Ravenclaw Chaser, and ended up right behind the opposing Seeker, accelerating smoothly to stay on his tail as he ascended high above the pitch.

"She's really good," Angelina admitted. "Her flying style reminds me of Harry."

"They trained together a lot this summer."

"Well, it shows," Angelina said. "She has an amazing awareness—"

Angelina's words were cut short as Ginny and Hermione stood on their seats, cupped their hands around their mouths, and bellowed over the rest of the family's cheers. "WAY TO GO, JAMIE!"

That made his eighth goal of the match. For some reason, all the current Hogwarts pupils in the family had scattered to sit with friends after James's first goal. Gryffindor/Slytherin were in the lead, one hundred sixty to forty.

"_Quietus_," Hermione said, returning her and Ginny's voices to normal volume. "An amazing awareness of what?"

"Of the other players," Angelina said. "She timed that duck and roll perfectly to end up exactly where she wanted to be."

Ginny renewed the warming charm on her seat before sitting down. "Well, Lily has had flying lessons since just before her third birthday. I had to teach myself, and I was six when I started sneaking the boys' brooms."

Hugo blocked a goal attempt by Murphy from Hufflepuff. Ginny, Angelina, and the boys whistled through their fingers as Hermione, who had never learned the trick, yelled and clapped her hands over her head.

"James is flying well too," Hermione said.

"He is." Ginny made no effort to hide the pride in her voice.

"Do you think he'll try out for the League next year?" Angelina asked.

"I don't know," Ginny said. "He mentioned that and the Auror Academy in the same breath a couple of weeks ago. He was teasing me about Quidditch being safer."

"Where on earth did he get that idea?" Audrey dropped down from the row behind. Without the kids, they had plenty of room to spread out and move around, and she had been visiting with Fleur. "Haven't you ever told him about all your injuries?"

"Not really," Ginny said. "There have been enough falls and bloody noses in family matches for him to get the idea, not to mention watching the Harpies."

"I'll say," Audrey said darkly. She was not particularly fond of Quidditch, but the Weasleys didn't give her much of a choice.

James had the Quaffle and was making a beeline for goal … under a Beater … away from the same Ravenclaw Chaser Lily had dodged a few minutes ago … towards the left hoop—or maybe center….

Ginny grabbed Hermione's arm, and they jumped up together. "WAY TO GO, JAMIE!"

()()()()

_Thirty-one minutes after the match_

James pulled on his cloak, ran his hand through his damp hair one more time, and left the changing room. CeCe waited just outside, and she threw her arms around his neck as soon as she saw him.

"Congratulations! You were brilliant." She beamed, blue eyes sparkling. "There's a joint party in the Great Hall. Frank and Louis told me."

James raised one eyebrow. "Mr. Head Boy is participating, is he?"

"Apparently he's the one who arranged with Professor McGonagall for the houses from the winning team to use the Great Hall for a joint celebration instead of separate common rooms."

"It is nice to have the Head Boy on our side. Where are Mum and Dad?"

"By the stands with Lily the last I saw them."

James reached for CeCe's hand, but she tucked it behind her back.

"Your parents…."

"Adore you," he said firmly. "And we won't have to say anything. I'm sure your dad will have already told them." He stretched out his hand again.

CeCe looked at it doubtfully. "But your mum … when she found out about Al and Maggie…."

"That's different. Mum found Al and Maggie in a broom closet, and trust me, she looked just as shocked as they did. She likes you. She'll be happy to see you've got such good taste." He grinned.

CeCe rolled her eyes. "Second thoughts, that's what I have, James Potter."

But she laced her fingers with his and fell into step beside him, and James felt the still-new rush of elation as they touched. Busy watching CeCe, who was busy pretending not to notice but blushed a becoming shade of pink, James didn't notice his parents until they were right on top of them.

"Hello," CeCe said.

James felt her hand tighten on his and gave it a reassuring squeeze.

"Hello, Cecelia," Ginny said. She looked pointedly from their joined hands and back to CeCe. Then Harry nudged her and she relaxed. "Had a good week?"

"A great week," CeCe said, smiling up at James.

"Great game, son," Harry said. He had one arm around Lily but clapped James on the shoulder with his free hand.

"We're very proud," Ginny added, leaning in to kiss his cheek.

"I never would have guessed," James muttered, and his mother laughed.

"I wanted to borrow Luna's lion hat, but I didn't think of it until yesterday, and George couldn't get it fixed it time. Remember the hat that roared, Harry?"

"Vividly," Harry said. Standing slightly behind his wife, he mouthed, "you're welcome" and winked.

James grinned. "Well, we couldn't have done it without Sticks here."

Lily scowled and made to jerk away from Harry, but he held firm. "Don't call me that!"

"Pixie Sticks," James taunted, just for the sheer pleasure of winding her up right under their parents' noses.

"Oh, James, don't tease her," CeCe said. "She flew really well today. The way you twirled around on your broomstick—you made my heart stop more than once!"

Lily gave James a final glare before turning to CeCe. "Thanks. You should come flying with us—it's really fun!"

The Potters had been trying to get CeCe on a broom for more than a decade.

"Oh, no. I like both feet firmly on the ground, thank you very much," CeCe said.

"I don't know, you look like a girl with her head in the clouds to me," Ginny said.

James turned to look at his girlfriend and was not disappointed—her cheeks were bright pink even as she smiled up at him again. She was so pretty when she blushed, and it was easy to make her do it. Especially now.

"Hey, Neville!" Harry raised one hand in greeting.

James and CeCe let go of each other and spun round in alarm. Harry, Ginny, and Lily fell on each other laughing.

"That's not funny," James grumbled, having seen nothing but the empty stretch of grounds leading up to the castle. Beside him, CeCe closed her eyes and took a deep breath.

"It's a lot funnier than a stupid nickname," Lily retorted.

"An after-party isn't a party without the Seeker and top-scoring Chaser," Harry said. "We should let them get to it, Ginny."

"All right." Ginny looked a little wistful. "Take care of yourself and be good. Do all your schoolwork, and don't distract CeCe too much—it's her O.W.L. year."

"I know, Mum."

"No more letters from Neville," she said firmly. "_Especially_ not about broom cupboards, or empty classrooms, or—or the greenhouses, or anything."

James felt his face getting hot. "Mum…."

"Don't worry, Mrs. Potter," CeCe said as Harry kissed Lily goodbye. "We'll be discreet."

James sucked in his laughter as Ginny shot a sharp gaze at CeCe, but she was distracted as Harry reached across her to grasp James's hand and pull him into a hug.

"I left something in your trunk," Harry said quietly. "Use it well."

James looked at his dad in surprise.

"But in all seriousness, James—"

"No more letters," James said. "I promise." He reached for his mother first and was pleased to see her face light up at the voluntary gesture. "Bye, Mum. I love you."

She squeezed harder, her face pressed into his shoulder. It still felt weird to look down and see the top of her head.

"I love you too, James." She stepped back slightly and looked straight into his face. "First, last, and always."

"I know, Mum. Thanks."

James would remember her smile for a very long time.

* * *

a/n: For those of you who missed it, I posted an outtake of this story two weeks ago. It's chapter eight of "One Big Happy Weasley Family." I really appreciate everyone's patience; I am home with my dad, who's laid up with a broken leg. Needless to say, that threw a big wrench in my writing plans. For my lovely British readers, if you don't recognize "pixy sticks," it's a candy-uh, sweet ;) Basically straight sugar with food dye added and wrapped in paper so you just rip off the end and pour the sugar into your mouth. "Pixie" as Lily's nickname is, of course, taken from the lovely and talented My Dear Professor McGonagall.

Thanks, everyone, for reading and especially for those of you who have reviewed faithfully!

ktoo


End file.
